


Spilled Ink

by Anonymous



Category: Myst Series, Old Kingdom - Garth Nix, Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - BDSM, Alternate Universe - Dark, Alternate Universe - Student/Teacher, Bad BDSM Etiquette, Barebacking, Controlling Kylo Ren, Creampie, Crossovers & Fandom Fusions, Cunnilingus, Dark Fairy Tale Elements, Dark Luke Skywalker, Dark Rey (Star Wars), Dark Reylo (Star Wars), Darkfic, Dead Dove: Do Not Eat, Dominant Ben Solo, Dominant Kylo Ren, Dry Humping, Edging, Exhibitionism, Explicit Sexual Content, Extremely Dubious Consent, F/M, Fellatio, Forced Marriage, Forced Masturbation, Forced Orgasm, Frottage, Fuck the Jedi, Inspired by Hades and Persephone (Ancient Greek Religion & Lore), Kylo Ren is Not Nice, Linking Book (Myst Series), Luke Skywalker Is The Worst, Master & Servant, Master/Servant, Master/Slave, Masturbation, Misogyny, Naked Female Clothed Male, Non-Consensual Bondage, Non-Consensual Drug Use, Non-Consensual Oral Sex, Non-Consensual Spanking, Non-Consensual Touching, Non-Consensual Voyeurism, Orgasm Delay/Denial, Past Child Abuse, Possessive Behavior, Power Imbalance, Praise Kink, Professor Ben Solo, Public Nudity, Public Sex, Rape/Non-con Elements, Rey is Nobody (Star Wars), Reylo - Freeform, Rope Bondage, Sexual Slavery, Sharing a Bed, Submissive Rey (Star Wars), Teacher-Student Relationship, Unsafe Sex, Vaginal Fingering, Villainfucking, institutionalized sexism, no beta we die like men, rey is explicitly white, sexy calligraphy
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-29
Updated: 2021-03-04
Packaged: 2021-03-11 03:53:45
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 4
Words: 22,652
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28398762
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: “I’m sure it was an accident, but accidents are costly. My resources, my time — those aren’t things to be squandered.”“I’ll be more careful in the future, sir,” Rey mumbles, abashed.The Professor studies her carefully, until she’s writhing in her own skin. This is more agonizing than one of Unkar’s backhands, standing here as he weighs her. “I’m sure you will. And to make sure that lesson sticks...”He leans back in his chair, spreading his bent knees, and nods to his lap.“Lie here.”Rey is purchased by Linking Book-maker Kylo Ren to assist in his search for a long-lost world — and in addition to being drawn into his service, she finds herself being drawn into his bed.OR,shameless villainfuckery ensues.
Relationships: Kylo Ren/Rey, Rey/Ben Solo, Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Comments: 100
Kudos: 274
Collections: Anonymous





	1. The Sorcerer

**Author's Note:**

> **This is a Very Dark Fic, world-wise. If you bump on ANY of the tags, click away now!**
> 
> Posting on anon because I have a fair few WIPs and I don’t want to disappoint people with my horny ADHD brain.
> 
> If you want to talk about this fic on social meteors, firstly thank you and you rock(!!!), and secondly **please use the hashtag #SpilledInkFic** because let’s be real, SO MANY TRIGGERS.
> 
> Speaking of…
> 
> **A FEW TW/CW NOTES**  
>  - **Rey is explicitly white in this fic.** Why? Because even though this is a fairytale-style setup, I don’t think it’s ethical to fetishize IRL slavery or anything like it. Tbqh in the ST she _should_ have been a WOC, and that is a conversation for a different place & time, but in this particular story, Rey is a white cis woman. This is a lead-in to Master/slave BDSM, & the framework in the world supports it.
> 
> -References to child slavery and exploitation exist in the text, but nothing very explicit or present in that regard. Candidly, Unkar wasn’t nice or good to her, but he also wasn’t a pedophile.
> 
> **WHERE THIS IS GOING**  
>  Rey’s going to be Kylo/Ben’s transcriptionist/assistant, and things will progress between them in a way that’s not explicitly consensual, but Rey _doesn’t dislike it_. There won’t be any violent assaults, but her lack of agency to say yes makes it noncon, despite the fact that she’ll be into the things he’s introducing her to.
> 
> **In order for her to be a villainfucker, though, he’s gotta be a villain to a decent extent.**
> 
> “Sendings” are cribbed from the Sabriel-verse.
> 
> There will be a happy ending for Rey and Kylo/Ben, but the story-world isn’t going to change on a structural level. Updates will probably drop biweekly (like every other week not twice a week — I’m not a monster, and I have a life. Vaguely).
> 
> This intro is cribbed from [The Island Effect](https://archiveofourown.org/works/23719903/chapters/56958043), which I did NOT write and am still anxiously awaiting the final chapters of. *sob*
> 
> **Tags will be updated as the story progresses.** I’m posting this with as many as I can think of, based on where the story’s going, but please double-check!!

It happens so quickly. Just the clink of a few coins changing hands and that’s it. 

She’s been sold.

✒️✒️✒️

Rey can feel the entire bazaar watching her, the thrum of hearty conversation quieting with curiosity as she gathers the few possessions that are unmistakably her own. Her fingers stumble in terror, movements stuttering like her breaths. 

The sorcerer isn’t a totally unfamiliar sight at Niima Outpost, but on the rare occasion he  _ does _ appear, he only buys junk from the dusty stalls. Odd bits and bobs.

Never a  _ person _ .

Until now.

Everything that will accompany her into her new life feels perilously light. The clothes on her back. Her staff. A canteen. Her goggles.

Her bedroll and tent belong to Unkar. No doubt he’ll just buy another child to take Rey’s place. Another set of hands to work as a junk picker during the day, another body to huddle beneath the tent’s patchwork roof every night as the desert wind howls.

Seventeen years in their company, and now she’ll never see those things again.

The sorcerer waits beside the stall, dark brow creased with impatience as Rey hurries to join him. His black clothes seem impervious to the blowing sand, as though the very world slides off him. Perhaps raw matter is as intimidated by him as  _ she _ is. As they all are here at the edge of the world.

“Let’s go.”

“Yes, sir,” Rey mutters, hurrying after her new master as he strides toward the edge of the market and the open desert beyond.

✒️✒️✒️

Surely he can’t intend to kill her. She’s no one. Nothing.

Yet walking out into the desert this way is tantamount to suicide. There’s nothing in this direction but fan canyons, unforgiving labyrinths of stone and steam.

Rey watches him warily through her scratched lenses, thighs burning with exertion as the unruly sand slides underfoot. He’s a huge rectangle of a man, easily twice her size. If he’d simply wanted to murder her he could’ve done that back at the bazaar, the coins still cool in Unkar’s palm. He could’ve snapped her neck in the middle of the market and none would’ve batted an eye.

She’s his property; he’d be well within his rights.

Rey’s seen far worse.

She replays the encounter in her mind as they walk, over and over as the windblown grit seeps through the fabric wrapped against her mouth and nose.

She’d simply been updating the stall’s ledger, tongue poking out of her mouth when the low voice startled her: “You have good handwriting.”

Her heart slammed against her ribs to find him watching her. Tall, scowling, pale — not a junker, not with those finely tailored clothes. Not with skin that’s smooth instead of chapped from living beneath an unrelenting sky.

She’d never seen him from so close before, but it was true what they said. That there was something peculiar and intense about him, like he was a thunderhead made flesh.

The sorcerer had taken the pen right out of her hand. Spun the ledger around to face himself — and Rey’s lips popped open to protest, but he wasn’t interested in the figures. He’d only scribbled something in the margin before turning the book back to her, holding out the pen as though it had belonged to him all along and now he was only loaning it back to her.

“Write that.”

Maybe she should’ve asked what the curious scribble meant, but Unkar was partial to discouraging questions with a sweaty backhand — and the sorcerer’s leather gloves squeaked ominously. So she simply copied it, making each loop and flourish identical to what he’d drawn.

The sorcerer had turned away even before Rey was done, his black cape snapping as he strode over to speak with Unkar.

Then came the coins.

Then the desert.

Then now, the sorcerer’s deep footsteps half-filling with sand before she reaches them. Her head spinning with terror, nausea clenching her gut.

✒️✒️✒️

By the time the sand gives way to the rusty rock of the canyons, Rey is exhausted, her canteen nearly empty. Not that she has to piss; it’s all evaporated through her skin, leaving her body veiled in sticky salt crystals.

The sorcerer’s expression is untroubled as he slips the filtration mask from his face and glances back, making sure she’s following through the tortuous, mist-veiled turns. Not that he needs to. There’s nowhere to go, nothing to live on this far out in the desert. No way to survive but to keep trailing him like a scrawny shadow.

Rey nearly stumbles into him when he finally stops. He glances around, dark eyes narrowed, but they’re alone with the whistling wind.

The cave mouth is humble, hardly a pit in the canyon wall, but he nudges her toward it, scouring away the signs of their passage with a scuff or two of his boots.

It’s only as she peels her goggles off her face, letting them hang loose around her neck, that she sees the book.

It’s hanging from the low ceiling, suspended within a metal cage beyond a lip in the cave mouth, out of sight of whatever pathway or track the sorcerer’s been following. The hulking man draws a key from his pocket, and with a few metallic clinks the cage’s hemispheres spring open, metal bars collapsing down like wing segments.

He reaches into his pocket and then turns to her, holding out one of his gloved hands — and it takes a moment’s squinting to find the outline of the glass phial he’s cradling. “Drink this.”

“Are you going to kill me, master?”

Rey’s voice is gravelly with disuse and fear — and he knits his brows at her words, glowering down at her in the close space. “Why would I kill you?”

She nods at the phial, still too afraid to take it. Is it poisonous? —is that why he’s wearing gloves? “What’s that, then?”

“It’ll make the trip easier.”

Rey blinks at him, baffled. The cave goes absolutely nowhere, unless there’s a passageway concealed too cunningly for her eyes. “Trip?”

A tendon snaps in the hollow of the man’s jaw. “Drink it. And don’t make me tell you a third time.”

“Yes, master,” Rey mumbles as she takes the phial. 

The glass is clear, the liquid within it a pale blue, almost violet in the light reflecting off the wind-carved rocks. The bottle is stoppered with a tiny cork, and she almost feels guilty for letting the chit of wood drop to the cave floor as she thumbs the phial open.

After rationing her water for so long, she hardly tastes the liquid as she swallows — but when she exhales, her breath smells sickly-sweet.

_ What now?  _ she wants to ask, but her tongue is abruptly leaden, barely responding to her commands. The cavelet reels drunkenly around her as she lurches forward, but something clamps tight about her body, brutal as iron.

Everything shifts again as her knees give out, but the floor doesn’t slam against her. Instead she’s enfolded by warmth, and another smell fills her nose — this one warm and welcoming, if unfamiliar.

It’s  _ him _ . The sorcerer.

He’s cradling her to his chest, carrying her in his arms like a sleepy child.

Whatever he gave her is strong, dragging her into unconsciousness with ruthless force, inescapable as his shadowed gaze.

“Sleep, Rey,” he murmurs, and she has no choice but to obey.

✒️✒️✒️

If she’s truly sleeping, it’s a dreamless slumber. Then she’s simply awake again, her eyes struggling open beneath the scratchy boulders of sand winkers.

Cold air nudges in at Rey’s skin as she scrubs at her eyes, and she blinks painfully as she fights for her bearings. It’s almost as chill as a desert night, but the air is quiet, the light dim. Wherever she is, she’s inside. Probably underground.

The room is nicer than anyplace she’s ever seen, the kind of chamber that only exists in books. It’s walled in bruise-dark stone, and the bed is so plush that she more rolls than sits upright.

She probes it, testing. Not that she doesn’t know what a mattress is, but she’s certainly never  _ slept _ on one before.

Someone’s set her on top of the blanket, and her boots are nowhere to be seen — but her staff is leaning beside the bed, and dark slippers await her on the floor.

Curious.

She gasps in fright as the heavy wooden door set in one wall swings open without preamble. A woman hurries in, the light so dim that Rey can’t make out her features.

Then she draws nearer, bustling closer to the bed — and Rey sees the woman doesn’t have features at all. 

Or rather, that the woman herself isn’t entirely there. She’s translucent like cloudy water, vaporous as smoke. Most curious of all is the way her not-there-ness  _ isn’t _ terrifying. Startling, yes; Rey’s heartbeat certainly doesn’t slow as the dark prism of a woman moves to the side of the bed, beckoning for her to follow, but Rey warily obeys. 

She’s probably dreaming anyway.

The shadow-woman guides Rey to a freestanding thing near an unlit hearth, already full of hot water, and indicates that she should shed her clothing, casting off a layer of shadows that fades into nothingness like dust motes. Then the amorphous being gently splashes the water.

“A bath?” Rey murmurs, overwhelmed at the sight of so much water — and  _ warm _ at that, but not sulphurous like hot springs. No, this is clean, pleasant; tiny flowers are even stirring amid the soft currents, pirouetting like dancers.

The woman-thing nods. Then, as though knowing Rey would prefer to be alone for these kinds of ablutions, she bustles back out.

The door shuts with a muted click, and the latch doesn’t move when Rey tries it a few minutes later. Pleasant as this chamber may seem, it’s still a prison, and Rey still a possession — but at least she’s meant to be a cleaner one.

Perhaps the sorcerer will care more for her than Unkar ever did.

Perhaps he already does. It wouldn’t take much.

The secret place between her legs heats even before she sheds her sand-encrusted rags and slips into the bath. He’s handsome enough. Quiet.

Rey likes the quiet.

The water reinvigorates her nerves like lightning straying over her skin. Reawakening her properly now — and she can note her surroundings more clearly. Small tables, one beside the bed, another with a chair tucked beneath. A huge rectangular wooden thing that looms against one wall, which reveals itself to be a wardrobe when the shadow-woman returns and produces a dark cotton slip from inside.

Rey scowls at the dress as the faceless construct lays it on the bed. “It’s alright, I can just wear my trousers.”

The amorphous woman-shape has already scooped up her ratty things — and even without features, Rey can tell that she’s displeased with Rey’s grimy clothes from the way she holds the pale things away from her not-fully-there body.

The spectral woman shakes her head, stopping beside the tub long enough to pick up a small cloth and dip it in the warm, scented water before handing it to Rey and continuing on out of the room.

Even without words, the message is clear.  _ Wash and dress. _

And Rey doesn’t want to keep her new master waiting.

✒️✒️✒️

The prismatic shadow-woman leads Rey through a maze of corridors no less exhausting than the fan canyons, all of them wrought of that same dark rock as the bedroom she awoke in. It’s a relief after a lifetime of sun — and though she fervently wishes she was wearing pants, the dress’s long sleeves are a welcome change from her own shorter ones.

Long after Rey’s lost any awareness of where they are, her faceless escort stops beside a closed door and raps.

“Enter.”

A tremor runs through her body even at the muted syllables. She remembers that voice.

Still, nothing can prepare Rey for what’s beyond the door as the ghostly, anonymous woman swings it open and ushers her through. 

Nothing in her life has  _ ever _ prepared her for this: shelves bearing jars of neatly organized samples of plant leaves, twigs, rocks. A huge, ragged chunk of roseate crystal held between bronze calipers, the measurement marks etched in strange symbols. More strange tools, the likes of which Rey can’t even fathom. Grand, circular windows that glow with emerald and azure light, but are frosted. Impenetrable.

One wall covered entirely in laden shelves of books.  _ That _ one holds her attention the longest, as she pauses beside another one of those strange table-and-chair pairings.

“I was beginning to wonder where you were.”

A strangled  _ eep _ bursts out of Rey’s lips as she finds him seated behind a massive slab of gleaming wood that’s set at the far side of the chamber on a raised dais. He doesn’t even look up — and her blood quiets in her ears enough to hear the soft, familiar scratching of quill against paper.

“I’m sorry, sir,” she manages, her voice soft amidst the room’s grandeur.

“Have a seat at the desk. I’ll be with you in a minute.”

She does as she’s bid, gratefully sinking into the chair and trying to wrestle it under the preposterous little table without snagging the dress’s hem. Her cheeks are burning and her brow’s beaded with perspiration by the time she’s settled — and mercifully it’s only then that he rises, his too-large frame unfolding atop the dais like a nighted falcon.

Even without the cape he cuts an imposing form, his dark tunic and trousers emphasizing his muscular physique as he collects a few things from his low terrace. He’s even more disproportionately massive as he moves to stand beside the desk he’s instructed her to take, setting the items before her.

A pot of dark ink. A metal quill, the nib elegantly narrow, the barrel heavy enough to thunk softly against the wooden desk — far nicer than anything Unkar possessed, let alone ever allowed Rey to touch. Several blank sheets of paper, and one that’s entirely covered in those curious markings, like the one she’d done for him back at the bazaar.

Rey’s new master taps the already-written page, and she sees his hands for the first time, his black leather gloves gone along with his cloak. Palms huge as paws, pale fingers easily half again as long as each of hers — not calloused, but not slight, either, and corded with sinew. All the more elegant for the lines of ink that stain them, dark as tattoos.

They’re strange hands. Strong hands.

“Give me one perfect copy,” the man tells her, his eyes flashing with nightfire as he moves the written page before her, the symbols incomprehensible, like him. Alien yet beautiful.

He strides back to his desk and resettles himself behind it, seemingly insensate to her presence at once.

✒️✒️✒️

One blank sheet is immediately besmirched, sacrificed as a page for Rey’s tremulous experiments — but the pen balances comfortably in her hand, like the slender metal implement  _ wants _ her to cradle it. Soon it’s only her own unfamiliarity with the characters that’s holding her back, like trying to spell words with the letters backwards and flipped.

Rey steals glances at her new master between her efforts. He might be her own age or a decade older. Maybe more ancient than that, if he has some magical means of preserving his preternatural good looks.

And he  _ is _ handsome, with plush lips and an aristocratic nose that match his stern brow. His angular jaw is clean-shaven, and hair darker than the midnight sky tumbles nearly to his shoulders, shiny as feathers.

Rey dips her quill into the inkpot mindlessly — and she must nudge it off the cramped desk with her arm, because suddenly glass shatters and the toes of her thin slippers are wet.

Her master’s chin snaps up, and he regards her sharply. “What happened?”

“I—” She’s at a loss, a stammering mess as she glances down around the desk’s edge. “I’m sorry, sir, I-I must’ve bumped it— I’ll clean up the mess—”

“Are you hurt?”

Rey shakes her head, blood singing in her ears. It’s not the kind of question Unkar’s ever asked — but her new master’s gaze is already downcast again, dark brows knitted with focus as he returns to his writing.

Does he actually  _ care? _

Rey’s chair’s legs scrape against the stone floor as she pushes back from the desk, the sound raucous in the velvet-quiet space, and her stomach drops as she surveys the mess. Twisted shards of glass and puddles of ink litter the polished stone floor around her feet — but then the door opens again, and another shadow-person hurries in from the corridor, this one a man. Or so Rey suspects.

“The sendings will deal with that. Come here.”

The man’s quill scratches, scratches incessantly as she creeps closer and hesitates beside the low, raised platform where he sits. From so close she can see the scattered pages before him; they’re all covered in that mystifying script.

“Do you know why I purchased you?”

“No, master,” she mumbles. How could she possibly?

“Professor.”

“No, Professor,” she echoes quickly, heart thumping with warning. “I-I’m sorry, Professor.”

“I need an assistant — one who can transcribe pages. One who will be completely loyal to me.”

Finally it makes sense why he bought her. Why her penmanship mattered so much to him that he’d actually pay coin for her life.

The man — the Professor — pushes back from his desk and turns to regard her, and her lower lip shivers as she drags in a breath. His eyes are the opposite of stars, twin pools of oblivion threatening to enfold her, yet his voice is cool. Untroubled. “I will keep you housed, closed, fed. In return, you will obey me without question. Are we clear?”

“Yes, Professor,” Rey whispers, clenching her hands into fists to keep from wringing them.

His expression is graven as he stares at her, as though he’s simply one of the mineral samples that are displayed about the room. “Apart from your loyalty, I think you’ll find I have relatively few expectations of you. But one thing I won’t tolerate is wastefulness.”

Rey’s cheeks flame with a mortified blush. She glances back at the little desk, where the shadowy figure is cleaning up her mess; the chaos of ink and glass is nearly gone, swept up within the sending’s spectral form.

“The materials I use are rare. Precious.”

“Professor, honestly, I didn’t—”

“Don’t interrupt.”

She falls silent, bile stinging the back of her throat as his seething gaze pins her feet to the floor.

“I’m sure it was an accident, but accidents are costly. My resources, my time — those aren’t things to be squandered.”

“I’ll be more careful in the future, sir,” Rey mumbles, abashed.

The Professor studies her carefully, until she’s writhing in her own skin. This is more agonizing than one of Unkar’s backhands, standing here as he weighs her. “I’m sure you will. And to make sure that lesson sticks...”

He leans back in his chair, spreading his bent knees, and nods to his lap. 

“Lie here.”

Rey’s heart slams — and her secret hollow is suddenly burning like his eyes, heated and inescapable.

The Professor’s fingers close around her wrist, and she feels like she’s sleepwalking as he pulls her closer. His skin is furious, living iron, and she moves numbly, following his silent urging as he draws her down across his muscular thighs.

Rey’s breaths shallow with fear, and she stares at the individual striae in the polished rock floor as something whispers against the back of her calves. Then fabric pools on the small of her back, and cool air kisses the curve of her bare arse.

Dread hits her chest with the force of a sledgehammer. He’s rucked up the back of her dress, and she isn’t wearing smallclothes. The sending in her bedroom hadn’t produced undergarments from the wardrobe. She’d been too distracted to think of it.

Her sex clenches with lust, nipples hardening to diamond points as one of his huge hands skims over her sensitive skin. Inspecting her.

No one’s ever touched her  _ here _ before — and it’s beautiful and terrible and wretched and wonderful, her body awakening at his soft touch.

“Count,” the man growls from somewhere overhead.

His first slap makes her body tremble long before the swell of her arse starts to sting, the blow rippling through her bones. Her cunt tightens along with the rest of her, pleasure chasing the pain in glorious waves.

“Out loud, Rey.”

He sounds perfectly untroubled, which makes it all the more awful when the next blow lands, mirroring the strike on her other cheek.

“One,” she grits out, jaw clenched — then a gasp tears out of Rey as his palm warms the patch of stinging skin, caressing her.

“Good.”

“ _ Two _ ,” Rey breathes, the word startled out of her as he spanks her again, harder now. Like his confidence is growing as she doesn’t break.

Another thunderclap resounds through every part of her body, honest pain shadowed by a sinful ecstasy.

“Three.”

His hand skates over the globes of her arse, each in turn. Groping her. Fondling her. Making her feel achingly empty in a way she’s never been before, save when she was alone in the patchwork tent late at night.

Then the warmth against her arse is gone, supplanted by pain.

“Four,” she murmurs.

Something hard twitches under her, nudging up into the plane of her belly.

The man’s thigh is warm beneath her cheek, comforting as a sunbaked stone. She could melt into him like this.

“Five.”

The searing in Rey’s arse cheeks crescendos, building into a silent scream. She winces, but his lap is unforgiving as the rest of him.

There’s no escape. Not that she  _ wants _ to, which is the most abominable thing of all.

The physical anguish is an odd relief, easing the humiliation of having ruined the inkpot. It’s soothing, cleansing — and she sighs with relief, sinking into the man who now owns her flesh if not her mind.

By  _ seven _ she’s mumbling.

By  _ nine _ she’s surging up in his lap, her body instinctively rebelling, but his free arm is there at the small of her back to pin her down against his thighs.

_ Ten _ slides out of her on a groan of something that’s neither agony nor rapture but both. The nudging thing at her lower belly is more urgent now, twitching into her body where she’s soft and yielding.

_ Fuck _ , it’s his cock. It must be.

Pleasure flares at the apex of Rey’s thighs, and she undulates weakly in the man’s lap, trying to think through the blissful sensations.

The hard length strains up into her where she’s yielding, in the valley between her hips, and she hears him draw a ragged breath. He palms her arse again, silkily but still firm enough to make her fingers twist into the fabric of his pants. 

Then something falls against the backs of Rey’s calves. She starts with surprise, but it’s only the back of her dress, bodice tugging as he pulls the loose fabric back into place.

“Stand up.”

There’s a different edge to his voice now, a raw timbre she’s never heard before — but as she levers herself to her feet she finds him hardly altered. A tendril of his glossy hair sweeps over his forehead, bouncing loose against his brow, and his pale cheeks are perhaps a shade or two pinker, but even  _ that _ much may be her imagination.

He turns to the side, and his stained fingers find another bottle of ink. His assault on her backside notwithstanding, he seems anxious to avoid touching her again, and she cradles it carefully in both hands as he offers it to her.

“Be careful with this.” He narrows his eyes, his infinite gaze fiercer than ever as he regards Rey. “Have I made myself absolutely clear?”

Her lips tingle strangely as she stares at his; they’re full and crooked and slightly parted. “Yes, Professor.”

“Professor Ren.”

Rey twitches her head in acknowledgement. She’s too distracted by the wanton pangs in her sex to trust her voice.

He nods curtly. “Good. Keep working.”

Rey hurries back to the writing desk, but it takes several long minutes for her fingers to stop trembling. The strokes from the unfamiliar nib tremble like her heartbeat every time she thinks of the raven-eyed man who now owns her, wondering whatever he might have planned and how she fits into his unfathomable designs.

_ Professor Ren _ . It’s a nice sort of name. Nicer than Unkar, certainly.

It seems the Professor’s going to be kinder than Unkar in lots of ways.

Rey can live with that.


	2. Across the Stars

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Tease yourself.” His eyes flare, his gaze unblinking. “ _Play,_ sweetheart.”
> 
> The endearment makes her fingers clench tight — and a throaty, wordless sound bursts out of her as she inadvertently pinches the stiffened peaks.
> 
> “Good girl,” the Professor rumbles. “How do they feel?”
> 
> “My tits, sir?”
> 
> The word tastes dirty. Wondrously so — and he chuckles. “Yes, pet.”
> 
> _Pet. Sweetheart._
> 
> Her pussy aches with need, awakening somehow.
> 
> “Soft. Warm.” Rey gasps at the beautiful, grounding pain as she twists herself. Plucking. Exploring as he’s bid. “Sensitive.”
> 
> “Exquisite,” he croons.
> 
> She’s so easily won over by his kindness.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ok, so it's been a week longer than expected, but attempted insurrection in my country, not really conducive to writing...
> 
> Refill your cups, loves. Self-care matters. 🖤

Rey’s life assumes a strange new rhythm — one that’s so far from her old existence that the desert and everything in it begins to feel like a sunburnt nightmare.

Without sun or sky it’s impossible to tell when one day ends and another begins. When she’s tired, she sleeps. When she’s rested, she wakes.

It feels positively luxurious.

Her waking hours themselves are spent copying pages of that alien script at the desk in her room.

“One perfect duplicate,” Professor Ren had instructed before dismissing her from his study, nodding to the slender volume on the corner of his desk as Rey’s arse burned from his touch. “Notify the sendings when you’re done.”

Mercifully the book’s pages are numbered in a familiar script, even if they  _ do _ range into the hundreds — and every mistake draws quiet curses from her lips. The sendings bring her meals, and she takes them alone in her quarters, turning aside and balancing the plate on her lap to avoid sullying both the original and her duplicate pages. The food is as unfamiliar as it is delicious, the pitchers of water sweet and clear.

She is careful with supplies.

Someone’s minding them, of course. The ink and paper never seem to run spare, and the heavy silver pen is clean every time she rises. Doubtless it’s one of the sendings; she can’t imagine the stormy-eyed Professor Ren slipping into her room while she’s sleeping, adding more crisp leaves to the stack and stealthily topping up her inkpot.

The idea that he  _ might _ be watching her sleep is a tantalizing one, evidence to the contrary notwithstanding. Every creak of the heavy wooden door makes her stomach twist with hope, but it’s only ever one of the sendings — or more often, nothing at all.

Until one day, when she turns to find her bedroom door standing ajar.

✒️✒️✒️

Rey’s heart thuds with warning, and she swallows hard, watching the door — but no one emerges from the far side.

“Hullo?” she calls tentatively, but there’s only silence.

She hasn’t checked the latch since the first time she awoke her, when she’d found it locked, and it seems inconceivable that the spectral sendings would forget.

_ Assistant _ . Rey still can’t believe it. She  _ doesn’t _ fully, in truth. And she doesn’t want to give him cause to take it back.

Or worse, sell her.

It takes her several long moments to get up the courage to approach the cracked door, slippers whispering against the polished stone — and she only means to nudge it shut, but then curiosity gets the better of her.

The Professor hasn’t explicitly restricted her to her room, after all. Surely there can’t be any harm taking a quick peek out into the corridor.

It’s as quiet as she recalls, only now there isn’t a sending to guide her along. The hallway is nearly as dark as the rock it’s wrought from, firelight flickering from sconces set at regular intervals along its walls.

Even from here she can see the corridor is empty.

Rey pads out into the shadows. Instinct tells her to explore in the opposite direction from the Professor’s study; she doesn’t fancy running into the imposing man and risk looking like she was trying to spy on him.

Instead she moves off the other way. Just to the nearest corner. Then another.

And another.

Every so often she happens across one of those heavy wooden doors, but they’re always closed. Locked.

Knowing that hers is the only one standing open, that she’ll be able to find her way back, makes it easier to keep going.

Eventually she finds her way to a place where the corridor meets a spiraling staircase that extends both above and below. Pale blue-green light glows from somewhere overhead, casting veins of light onto the smooth wall that change like reflections in water — and even though Rey knows she should turn back, her footsteps draw her onward, upward.

Once she’s through an archway where the stairs pass behind a wall, suddenly there’s nothing over her head and she can see the sky — and her breath catches in her throat.

The lack of windows in her room and Professor Ren’s study had been conspicuous, but she’d assumed they were underground; how else could it possibly stay so cool at every hour? 

Yet now, as she emerges onto a coin of flat stone bounded by a waist-high wall and the wind nudges into her hair, there’s a sort of click in her vision.

How very wrong she was.

The sky is dark and studded with stars — and even a cursory look makes it clear these aren’t the constellations that have watched over Rey her entire life. Amorphous, blue-green light glows over the vault like a veil, shifting every moment, so fantastical that for several long moments all she can do is stare in awe.

Rey doesn’t begin to grasp how high she is in the air until she reaches the circlet of stones at the edge of this strange edifice, a wide railing against what lies beyond. The earth is as darkling as the sky, ashen dunes lying storeys beneath that roll away to an occluded horizon on three sides. The fourth overlooks a glowing sea that matches the lace over the sky — and as Rey completes her circuit, peering down the building’s stark face, she realizes three things simultaneously.

First, she’s at the top of an immense tower. 

Second, the tower doesn’t appear to connect with the shoreline below.

Third — and most unsettling given her proximity to the stomach-swooping drop — she’s no longer alone.

He’s standing there when she turns, waiting for her. Watching her from the top of the stairs.

Professor Ren.

He’d seemed so tall the day he bought Rey, looming over her like a shadow in twilight. Some part of her must’ve been expecting him to be shorter or perhaps less broad now that he isn’t leading her into a sandy wasteland, but he isn’t. If anything, he seems  _ more _ imposing without the dark cloak snapping about his body or a desk between them.

“I’m sorry, Professor Solo,” Rey gasps as her face burns in mortification. The sending in her room hasn’t produced anything resembling trousers or pants from the wardrobe; suddenly she’s conscious of the way her dress grazes the swell of her arse, the wind nudging into her like his implacable touch. “I-I didn’t mean to—”

“ _ I _ meant to,” the dark-eyed man supplies, enunciating distinctly.

She gapes at him for a few long moments. The idea that she might’ve been  _ intentionally  _ released from the chamber hadn’t even crossed her mind. “Sir?”

His full lips tighten almost imperceptibly. “I don’t suppose you’ve ever heard of a Loth-cat?”

Rey keeps her gaze trained on him as she shakes her head. He seems perfectly at ease at this gut-tightening height, but she can’t tell whether he’s smirking or it’s merely the watery light playing over his patrician features.

“The first step to training one is to make it feel at home.” Professor Ren strides forward — not toward Rey, but to stand at the parapet’s edge a safe distance away. Out of arm’s reach. Only then do his dark eyes find hers, smoldering into her and heating her blood. “You can’t do that by tying a leash on it and dragging it around to get the lay of the land. So you give it a chance to explore.”

The corner of her vision lifts as she arches an eyebrow, bemused. “Are you comparing me to a cat, Professor?”

“You do have a bit of the feline about you. Especially around the eyes.” 

He says the words matter-of-factly, but she burns for him all the same. Her muscles are bowstring-taut, and the way her sex clenches sends a pleasurable shiver through her entire body. A lock of ink-dark hair falls over the Professor’s forehead as he nods at their eldritch surroundings, and her pulse skips. 

“What do you think of your new home?”

“Home…” She frowns, considering the word. “I suppose I hadn’t thought of it that way, sir.”

“Why not?”

“It seems too good to be true,” Rey admits, flushing from the soles of her feet to the roots of her hair.

He chuckles, the sound more surprise than mirth, and crosses his arms over his chest. Mirroring her. “You’re not scared out of your mind?”

“Being this high up?” Rey nods to the drop, fingers tightening on the parapet’s edge even as her mouth twists in a shy smile. “Of course, I’m not bloody mad.”

“I mean you’re not afraid of me,” he amends.

“Do you want me to be?”

His plush lips part, dark eyes flaring as he drags in a breath.

It’s a bold thing to venture — and Rey’s feet might be firmly planted but her stomach’s in free-fall as they watch each other.

“Interesting,” the Professor murmurs. 

Then he blinks, and the moment’s gone.

He nods to the top of the stairs, already in motion. “Come with me.”

Rey takes a last, longing look at the sky, then hurries after him. Perhaps if he’s showing off such a view, he’ll let her steal a few hours for stargazing.

✒️✒️✒️

She catches up to the larger man on the wide stairs down. “Professor, may I ask a question?”

“You’re welcome to ask any question you think of, Rey.” It’s a good thing she’s focused on the stairs; the deep hum of his voice as he utters her name makes her knees quake. “Whether or not I choose to answer them is at my own discretion.”

“Of course, Professor,” she answers automatically. “I… That is… How did we come so far?”

The nape of Rey’s neck prickles with warning, and she glances up to find him watching her, evidently so familiar with the stairs that he can ignore them altogether as they descend. His eyes glitter like jet. “Where do you think you are?”

“Across the stars, Professor.” The words sound insane, but she can’t deny her very eyes. “Or beneath  _ other _ stars, if such a thing is even possible. More than that I couldn’t say with any certainty.”

The Professor hums softly. “That’s a keen observation. What else did you see upstairs?”

“A glowing light in the sky, and a glowing sea beneath.”  _ Those _ she won’t soon forget. 

“Not water — gas.”

Rey steals another glance at her master, but he’s looking ahead, brow furrowed. “Gas, Professor?”

Mercifully, he glances down at her and sees her scowl of confusion. “You must’ve seen fog before, at least.”

She nods. Of course.

“Like that. It’s heavier than air, so it collects in basins, valleys, that sort of thing — but it’s not a sea, strictly speaking.”

“I wish there was a window in my room to see them better,” she murmurs without thinking.

Something twitches in her peripheral vision, and she looks up again to find him frowning down at her. “A window. Really.”

“I’m so sorry, Professor Ren,” Rey squeaks as her stomach plummets. “I don’t mean to be ungrateful, I only—”

“I didn’t think you were being ungrateful.” His expression is grave; he certainly doesn’t  _ look _ like he’s fooling with her.

And it’s too late to take it back; he’s staring at her, and she blunders on: “It just feels strange that someone should build a tower, but put no windows in it.”

“Perhaps it’s for the very reason this place was built to begin with.”

A different kind of thrill runs through her. “Is it a vault?”

“A vault, a doorway, a refuge…”

She looks down just in time to keep from stumbling as they reach the foot of the stairs — and it takes nearly two of her own steps to match even one of his long strides on level ground. “Refuge, Professor?”

His mouth tightens. “For my studies.”

“Of course, sir,” Rey says instinctively — but even without understanding her new master, she knows he’s lying.

Perhaps he’s spent too much time with the featureless sendings to catch himself. A lifetime at Niima Outpost has been a keen teacher; she knows the signs of an unpracticed liar.

_ Why _ her new master should lie to her is an unsettling thought — but she’ll have to ponder his deception another time, because the mountainous man leads her around one last bend in the corridor and suddenly they’re at the labyrinth’s end.

A single door waits. Not a heavy wooden door as she’s seen elsewhere in the tower, but one that’s so dark that it looks like a slab of pure shadow.

There’s no knob, but a sending erupts from the center, ghosting through it from whatever lies beyond. 

The sending’s appearance gives Rey a bit of a turn; she’s getting used to it when they do that. She steps aside as the spectral being moves toward them, brighter and more amorphous than the others, more like a spark than a silhouette.

The Professor barely flinches, only a tendon popping in his temple as the sending passes through his body. Then the air shifts around them, and the sending vanishes.

When Rey looks ahead the black door has vanished along with it.

The huge man waits for her just across the threshold. The room beyond is silent, still — circular like the chamber that holds the corkscrewing staircase, and dim until the Professor reaches up and touches a lantern hanging from the low ceiling.

A golden orb glows to light, bathing their surroundings in amber light, and Rey’s heart stutters again as she sees the pedestals.

Five of them in all. Far nicer than the crudely-hewn one in the cave hidden away in the canyons, each bearing its own heavy tome.

“This is the Book Room,” Professor Ren tells her. His black gloves squeak softly as he clasps his hands before himself. “You’re not to try to come down here without me, is that clear?”

“Yes, Professor.” Her gaze flicks back to the doorway, but it’s still empty. He notices, of course — and Rey feels compelled to add, “I suspect I  _ can’t _ get in here without you, sir.”

“That’s correct. And I don’t want you to waste your time trying.”

Her arse cheeks tingle with awareness, and she nods silently. She already knows how her owner feels about waste.

He closes the distance to the nearest book podium, never fully turning his back on her. Under the glowing sphere’s light she can appreciate the harsh angles of his face, the broad plane of his back. “Do you remember how we got here?”

“I remember the book, Professor. Then…” A searing blush fills her cheeks as she remembers the tightness around her body, and the rich, musky aroma filling her nose. The moment of shock as she realized it was  _ him _ . “Th-Then I was here.”

A notion occurs to her — and it seems impossible, but so has everything else since the sorcerer bought her.

“Are we  _ inside _ your book?”

“A Linking Book, or  _ korvakh _ , is a bridge to another world — an  _ Age _ . The Age is described in a matching Descriptive Book, or  _ kormahn _ .” She drifts forward, curious as he flips the nearest tome open. The leaves are so densely tattooed with the alien script that the thick book crackles with ink. “All this — everything that’s written in these pages — speaks to the Age on the far side.”

Rey stares, fascinated, as the dark man flicks through a few more pages before gently closing the book again. “Is it… Do only sorcerers have Linking Books and Ages, sir?”

“I’m a scientist, not a sorcerer,” he corrects gruffly. “And no — although historically it’s been my people, the Jedi, who’ve controlled them.”

Now she truly  _ is _ afraid of him again. Everything she’s ever known reduced down to a single volume. One book, in all of a vaster creation than she’s ever imagined.

It’s unfathomable.

Her heart is already wringing at the end of every beat, like fear’s trying to squeeze the very life out of her. “Is mine one of your worlds?”

The Professor’s countenance darkens. “I don’t  _ own _ Ages, Rey. No one does. It’s very important you understand that.” He nods to the other podiums. “Once a bridge between Ages exists, it’s the responsibility of whoever built it to safeguard it from those who would exploit the Age on the far side.” He pauses, dark brow knitting. “You asked if this tower was a vault, and it is — but in another sense, the world itself  _ is _ the vault for the  _ kormahntee _ , the Age books I’m protecting. Does that make sense?”

“I think so.” The Age books are each hundreds of pages long, if not thousands — and another question percolates to her lips: “How many Ages  _ are _ there?”

He chuckles. “I’m not sure anyone could answer that question.”

“So why these five? —I-If you don’t mind me asking, Professor,” she adds as her face flushes with heat. “I’m not trying to be impertinent.”

“You aren’t. It’s a thoughtful question.” A frisson of pleasure slips through her as the huge man nods approvingly. “Each of these worlds holds something I need to make Books.” He pauses, and Rey shivers as his gaze finds hers, stirring her again. “Would you like to see them?”

“The … Ages?”

Amber light glints off the Professor’s hair as he retrieves a slim piece of crystal beside the thick volume, holding it up in his black-gloved fingers. “You mentioned something about wanting a window.”

It’s about the size of his palm, and translucent enough to see through — but as she holds out her hand to take the slender stone he twitches it back out of her reach.

“Don’t touch. Not without gloves.” The stone slab must have magnification properties, because as the Professor holds it up for her inspection, everything on the far side looks larger, clearer. “Technically speaking it’s fine as long as it’s not near a Linking Book, but I don’t want you forming any bad habits.”

Her stomach lurches as their gazes meet. There’s so much beauty in this world, this Age … but the grave, obsidian-eyed man is even more breathtaking than these Books or the glowing sky.

Professor Ren opens the book’s front cover, paging through a few blank sheets until he reaches one that holds the ink outline of a rectangle wider than it is tall. “Watch carefully.”

Rey squints at the page as he settles the crystal window over the empty outline — and then she hears herself gasp as ink bleeds through the paper from beneath.

It’s not just black; it’s deep blues and grey and even blotches of white, running across the paper under the crystal and spreading until the entire rectangle is bathed in vibrance.

The image is somehow  _ moving _ , the colors shifting and sharpening even as she watches. Suddenly the image resolves, and Rey finds herself staring, stupefied, at the palm-sized window and the roiling seashore beyond.

Now she can understand why the Professor warned her not to touch the crystal viewer. The moving picture inside the rectangle is mesmerizing, so surreal that she clenches her fists to keep her hands at her sides.

“Kamino,” Professor Ren murmurs as the boisterous sea surges before them. She remembers oceans from a picture book, but the images had been dingy with age and dirt, nothing like the chaotic splendor that seems within reach. “For ink.”

Rey’s heart sinks as he slides the crystal rectangle away from the rectangle, the moving image within it instantly fading — but after he closes the tome’s front cover, he walks to the next podium.

He does the same thing here as before, opening the  _ kormahn _ to the empty panel and settling the crystalline window over it. 

The image that bursts to life in this Book begins with a flood of green, the verdant forest that resolves from the moving ink more vegetation than Rey’s seen in her entire life together. “Takodana, good for cordage and boards.”

The third book overlooks an Age of fiery lava and ominous black mountains. “Mustafar, for crystal.”

The fourth world is a glorious mix of water and earth, emerald-crested hills giving way to cerulean depths — and the Professor’s full lips twist as he gazes down into the crystal and all that lies beyond it. He taps the page with a gloved forefinger. “I still haven’t found a suitable alternative to paper from Naboo, though it’s not for lack of trying.”

The fifth Age makes her heart thump strangely again, even before the moving image resolves. Then there’s a lump in her throat as she stares down at Niima Outpost.

Even though she’s never seen it from this vantage — how could  _ anyone _ but birds? — she knows it instantly. The sprawling, ever-shifting dunes. The maze of tents at the bazaar, weatherbeaten tarps patchworked to hell and back.

“The Age of Jakku,” Professor Ren says as the vision shifts, soaring out into the vast nothingness, losing itself in the canyons and the endless mist.

_ Jakku _ .

Her life. Her past. Her  _ everything _ .

All held in this book. This  _ kormahn _ .

Her head is spinning like the view through the palm-sized crystal window. “What could you possibly need from my world, Professor?”

“I just like Jakku.”

He says it easily, lightly. Another lie. That same wooden affect betrays him, let alone the sentiment itself.

It only takes her a few moments to work it out: “You use it as some sort of … pass-through, don’t you? Jakku and this place. Like this tower and this world. A vault within a vault.”

“Interesting.” The Professor’s expression is unreadable. “Tell me how you arrived at that conclusion.”

“It’s a wasteland, sir,” she laughs mirthlessly. “What other use for it could you  _ have? _ ”

“Wastelands can hold treasures for those who know where to look.”

He gazes into her, searching her. As though her mind is one of these volumes, everything about her laid bare for his inspection.

“Are you going to teach me how to make Books, Professor Ren?”

“That’s my hope. The sendings have their limitations.”

So he really  _ does _ need an assistant.

Rey shivers again as his gaze travels the length of her body, lingering on the swells of her breasts and where the thin dress clings to her thighs.

The desert fades from the crystal window as the Professor sets the stone aside, and he flips the Book shut with a deep thunk.

“Come with me,” he orders, expression shuttered like his mind’s already elsewhere — and she obediently follows.

✒️✒️✒️

The Professor wordlessly leads her back up the corkscrewing stairs and through more anonymous corridors to a bedroom that’s not unlike her own. It’s just as spare of extraneous furniture, only a bed, wardrobe, and a small writing desk with its own chair.

In lieu of a bathtub a comfortable reading chair rests before the hearth — and though the heavy wardrobe is closed, Rey can imagine what she’d find if she were to open it. Simple, dark tunics and trousers, doubtless, like he’s wearing now.

His scent perfumes the air, and she’s confident enough of the answer to ask the question: “Whose room is this, Professor?”

He moves to the hearth, where a fist-sized glass sphere rests in a raised iron frame. The thing is set among a clutch of prongs like a cabochon — and as he nudges the curious metal thing with his boot, it glows to life just like the chandelier in the Book Room, bathing the room in warmth and roseate light. “Mine.”

She doesn’t notice the sending lurking in the corridor behind them until he nods, and by then the heavy door is already swinging shut.

Everything beyond the room disappears in the clunk of heavy wood meeting its frame. Then Rey’s nerves thrill with excitement because they’re alone together in his bedroom.

The orb in the hearth burns like an ember, brightening as the moments pass. It’s growing uncomfortably hot so close to the glowing sphere, and she shifts as her body flushes, the dress clinging to her as she starts to perspire.

“Is your room comfortable?”

His voice is gruff but still soft somehow. Rey glances up from the hearth but the glass globe is still there, the afterimage seared into her vision and obscuring him like a cloud. “Y-Yes, thank you, Professor.”

“I’ve found it to be warm enough on that level. If you catch a chill let the sendings know, and they’ll set up a fire marble for you.”

_ Fire marble _ . A kind of crystal, surely.

It looks like a piece of the burning Age, though she stumbles a little on the unfamiliar name. “From … Mustafar.”

“Ah, so you  _ were _ paying attention.”

Professor Ren prowls about Rey in a slow circle, and she stares down at the stone floor, trying to will her vision into clearing. She can feel him watching her, his gaze tracing over her bare neck, along her clavicle, lingering on the rise of her breasts.

He wants her.

It’s not a terrible thing to feel wanted by him.

Rey blinks away the worst of the blotches in her vision as he stands before her again, tugging one glove off with the other. “Unkar assured me you haven’t been with anyone before.”

“Been with?” she murmurs, thoroughly distracted by the sheer size of his hands. They’re huge, at least half again the size of her own, stained with ink. Just as she remembers.

“Sexually.”

Her heart thumps, and she shakes her head, knees banging together as her thighs clench with lust.

“Shame.” He sinks into his reading chair just a few feet away and regards her solemnly, letting his gloves fall to the floor with a muted slap. “Open your dress.”

Her head spins, but her hands find their way to the ribbon that’s tucked under her neckline, tied in a bow. 

His ravenous gaze drops to her fingers as she draws it open, and her gut twists nervously as she pulls the loose fabric down, baring her breasts to the warming air — and her owner’s gaze.

“Mm,” he hums, resettling himself in the chair and letting his massive hands rest in his lap.

For a long while he simply stares at her, tracing idle strokes along the front of his trousers with his fingertips. Her mind screams in reproach — she’s never been naked in front of anyone else, not like  _ this _ — and she writhes as a bead of perspiration traces its way down the hollow of her spine.

Oddly, it feels more perverse with her still half-dressed like this. At least locked away in her room working on her transcribed copy of the Book, she’s being properly useful. Like this, she’s merely being used.

The worst part is how she  _ doesn’t _ hate it.

She bites her lower lip as the goosebumps rippling across her skin makes her nipples stiffen — and the raven-haired man grasps himself more firmly, running his cupped hand along his length.

His ardor’s rousing.

She’s not ignorant to the nature of coitus; she’s seen dogs rutting, of course, and she’s even spied on Unkar a few times when he’s had whores back to his tent. The sight of the nubile women riding the leathery old man, moving sinuously as he grunted beneath them, was certainly instructive regarding the primitive mechanics — but the hollow between her legs is wet, hungry in an altogether new way as she watches her master caressing himself.

“Does that bring you pleasure, Professor?” she breathes, hypnotized by his languid movements.

“This?” His graceful fingers flex, tightening on himself where he’s hard and swollen. “What do you think?”

Rey hesitates a few heartbeats, then nods.

“Yes, Professor Ren,” he prompts, his voice dangerously soft.

“Yes, Professor Ren.”

He sucks air through his teeth, nudging his hips up against his own hand as she echoes his words. 

“I’m sorry, Professor,” Rey adds, secretly delighted but pitching her voice deferentially low. “I meant no disrespect.”

“You might not be trained to my liking, but you  _ do _ catch on quickly. Maybe it won’t be so much work breaking you in.” His eyes flick up to meet hers, and the intensity of his gaze sends a jolt through her body. “Touch yourself.”

She skims her knuckles along the undersides of her breasts, following the gentle curves. “Like this, Professor?”

“More.” His fingers creak on the fabric of his trousers as he rubs himself harder. “Cup your tits for me.”

Rey lets the loose folds of her dress drop against her stomach and cradles her breasts, lifting them until the sensitive flesh threatens to spill out of her hands.

“Yes…” The shadowy man groans, palming himself. “Now play with your nipples.”

She scowls, loathing her accursed innocence. “Sir?”

“Tease yourself.” His eyes flare, his gaze unblinking. “ _ Play _ , sweetheart.”

The endearment makes her fingers clench tight — and a throaty, wordless sound bursts out of her as she inadvertently pinches the stiffened peaks.

“Good girl,” the Professor rumbles. “How do they feel?”

“My tits, sir?”

The word tastes dirty. Wondrously so — and he chuckles. “Yes, pet.”

_ Pet. Sweetheart. _

Her pussy aches with need, awakening somehow.

“Soft. Warm.” Rey gasps at the beautiful, grounding pain as she twists herself. Plucking. Exploring as he’s bid. “Sensitive.”

“Exquisite,” he croons.

She’s so easily won over by his kindness.

He lifts his chin, and as he clenches his jaw he suddenly looks like a prince. How she always imagined one might look, anyway. “Have you ever seen a hard cock before, Rey? You don’t have to lie to me if you have.”

She twitches her chin from side to side. “Not exactly, Professor Ren.”

His hands move higher, and he unfastens his pants, shoving them down without breaking eye contact. “Go on. Look.”

Rey gulps, her mouth dry with need as she lets her gaze drift down the front of his tunic to find his naked erection. She murmurs as he takes himself in his hand, fingers caging the thick, hungry length that stretches nearly to his navel.

He pushes his hand to the bottom of himself, hissing softly as his sex throbs, veins visibly pulsing as he tightens his grip. 

“Base.” The Professor slides higher, grasping the middle of his length. “Shaft.” He moves higher still to his terminus, running his fingertip along one of the curved pink ridges mirrored at his tip. “Glans. Or cockhead, if you prefer.”

“Base. Shaft. Glans,” she repeats, enunciating carefully as she draws circles around her areolas with her forefingers — and she gasps shallowly as her nails graze her own tender buds. “Cockhead.”

“My phallus.”

“Phallus,” she repeats, dazed.

His pillowy lips quirk in a crooked smile. “I knew you were a good investment.”

It’s awful. Inescapable.

She wants to touch him  _ there _ .

Rey knows her lips are parted, and she pants with unslaked desire as the Professor runs his hand along his rigid cock.

An opal shines at the tip of him, blooming from his slit — and he smears it between his thumb and index forefinger, holding the pearlescent blot up for her inspection. “Precum.”

“Is that—“ She swallows, half-choking as she swallows hard. “—your seed, Professor?”

“It’s what comes before.”

He massages the substance into his smooth cockhead, fingertips tracing wet designs in his own skin and thrusting through the ring of his thumb and bent fingers. Then he lifts his chin, jutting it toward her lower body. 

“Take off your dress.”

The undisguised lust in his eyes makes it so easy to push her dress lower that it’s tumbling from her hips what feels like only a moment later.

She’d imagined it might be horrific. Shameful. Demeaning somehow.

His unflinching gaze holds refuge, and her hands dangle at her sides as he stares, working his rigid prick in an unbroken rhythm.

Soft, wet sounds rise from his caged fingers, the slickened rod clicking against his skin as he thrusts through his own grip.

“Turn around,” he rasps. “ _ Slowly _ . I want to keep enjoying myself.”

She casts her gaze down, focusing on the pooled circle of her dress. “Is that why you purchased me, Professor? To enjoy yourself?”

He chuckles lazily. “I  _ did _ buy all of you. No reason I shouldn’t enjoy everything you have to offer.”

Her arse prickles with awareness as she turns around as he’s bid. She’s grateful for the fire marble’s warmth now; between that and her slippers it’s actually more comfortable being naked than swathed in her dress.

“I suppose I should consider breeding you,” Professor Ren muses as she completes her revolution before him, more precum shining along his length as he strokes harder. “What would you think of that?”

Rey’s heart hammers, torn between her longing to feel him push into her where she’s wet and yielding, and terror of all the consequences if he does.

“I-If it please you, Professor … I’ve only just begun to realize how little I actually know,” she ventures, not daring to look any higher than where he’s tending to himself. His furious member twitches in his massive fist, and another pearl of precum beads at his slit. “I wouldn’t quite know how to teach someone else when I’m the one who still needs time for learning.”

He groans — a deep, guttural sound ripped from the depths of his chest — and Rey’s pussy clenches in ecstatic response. “You need a teacher.”

Now she  _ does _ lift her gaze — and the ravening look in his eyes as he watches her, grinding his cock through his tight fist, is enough to make her whimper with lust.

“I’d like that, Professor,” she grits out through the aching hunger. “Very much.”

“Turn around.”

She obeys, and the nape of her neck thrills as she hears him stand and move just behind her.

Her naked back warms as he draws near, like there’s a fire marble burning under the surface of his skin. He’s so close that he must be taunting her; even without touching she can feel him moving, still stroking himself. Maybe more fervently now.

His scent enfolds her like a spectral embrace, sunbaked rocks and crushed berries and a spiced aroma that makes her mouth water.

Rey starts to turn her head — and then her jaw scalds as his strong fingers catch her chin, stopping her. “Eyes forward.”

“Yes, Professor,” she mumbles, abashed, and then disappointed as he releases her.

“I could start now.” Her hollow cramps with need, the quiet rhythm of his strokes quickening somewhere behind her, mere inches from her arse cheek. “Bend you over the end of my bed, or just lean against the wall … take your flower all at once and get it over with.”

Her fingers find their way between her thighs, finding her dripping crevice and slipping along herself from clit to hollow as she shivers.

“Would you like that?”

“Yes, Professor,” she breathes. His fingers graze the globe of her arse, the connection an electric jolt of pleasure, and her spine arches. “Please use me how you see fit.”

He inhales deeply, so close to her neck that Rey can feel his indrawn breath. “I can smell how much you want it. You’re thirsty to get fucked, aren’t you?”

She nods shakily, not even trusting herself to speak as she slips her fingers through the silken petals of her folds, thumbing her clit until she’s on the brink of pure bliss.

Rey wants him to yank her back to the chair and settle her onto his lap like one of Unkar’s whores. She wants to feel him bury himself in her, grunting with each sharp thrust, fucking her to his finish.

“D’you know what an orgasm is, Rey?” the Professor burrs, his voice becoming ragged with his quickening movements.

“Wh-When I come, sir?”

“Yes.” Her scalp prickles as he inhales again, scenting her hair. “Your orgasms belong to me now. Is that clear?”

Her touch falters at her pussy. “Professor Ren, I—”

She mindlessly turns her head, trying to find him — but something hard and warm bounces against her hip as he catches her chin again. “Eyes forward.” His hand drops lower, catching her wrist and guiding her back. “Keep touching yourself.”

“Yes, sir,” she mumbles.

Then his heat is gone and he’s moving behind again, setting her body by his very nearness. How he’s left her  _ wanting _ .

“You’re such a tiny thing. It’d probably hurt if I took you in one thrust.”

“Let me try, Professor,” Rey begs, twisting her fingers into her slick channel, desperately trying to sate the wanton tension that’s tearing her apart. She’s empty, hollow for the first time in her life. “Please … i-if you just touch me a little…”

“The way I’m feeling right now, I don’t trust myself to even slip a finger into that sweet kitty of yours,” he growls. “I’d want more.”

She whines in frustration.

“It’ll be fun breaking you in. I’ve been alone for too long.”

An abyssal sound wrenches out of him, and then soft fabric flicks against her hip as he sighs with release. Rey steals a quick glance; he’s caught his seed in a kerchief, graceful fingers holding his cock tight.

Gods, he  _ is _ massive — and the ache in her cunt rises to a throbbing need.

“Come for me. _ Now _ , Rey. ” The Professor’s arm snakes about her waist, steadying her body as she works herself. “Give me an orgasm. It’s mine, and I want it.”

“Yes, Professor Ren,” she mewls, half-lost already by his touch. “I’m trying…” 

His warmth is perfect, and he kneads his cloth-wrapped cock against the small of her back. “Faster. I don’t like to be kept waiting.”

“Yes,” Rey gasps as rapture rises to shatter her. “ _ Yes… _ ”

His softening phallus presses into the small of her back as he pins her to him, his other hand claiming one of her breasts. It’s just what she needs to fall apart — and next thing Rey knows she’s sagging back against him as ecstasy pours through her belly.

It’s so much she can hardly bear the seething sensations… but it would be better if he was breaking her open, filling her. Her womb the chalice for his spend.

“Good girl.” He massages her tit, thumb lighting on the rosy peak of her nipple and circling lightly. “ _ Very _ good. You’re such a quick study.”

“Th-Thank you, Professor.”

Rey’s thighs engage as she struggles to her feet, embarrassed to be slumped against him like she’s swooning, doubly mortified by the popping sounds as she extracts her fingers from her sex.

”Get dressed.”

She stumbles to the dress and drags it over her head — but it takes multiple fumbling attempts to tie the twill ribbon at her neckline, tucking her breasts modestly beneath.

When she turns back he’s dressed, too, only a faint flush in his cheeks to betray what they’ve just done.

The Professor moves to his writing desk and picks up a pair of silver-rimmed spectacles, settling them on the bridge of his nose. “What page are you on?”

Rey scowls in confusion.

_ Oh _ . Her transcription work.

“Page four hundred thirty … um …-six, I think, Professor?”

“Excellent.” He picks up a piece of paper, studying it without sparing her so much as a glance. “Back to your work, then.”

She blinks at him, astonished by the abrupt shift — but he’s already gone.

“Y-Yes, Professor.”

A sending is already waiting outside his bedroom door, and a chill coils about Rey’s body as she follows the wispy creature back toward the spiral stair.

Whatever else he is, or may be, there’s something fascinating about Professor Ren. And she  _ can _ learn from him; whether the Ages in the shadowed Book Room are worlds unto themselves or merely bridges doesn’t matter.

If she can learn  _ how _ to write from them, perhaps she can find a way to escape. Find her freedom for the first time in her life.

It’s been utterly unthinkable until now.

But does she  _ want _ to escape? To be truly, utterly  _ alone? _

It’s a daunting thought, potent enough to make her feel queasy — and her fingers tremble for the rest of the day, the strokes of her silver pen shaky with a flood of possibilities.


	3. Diamond of the Desert

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “But—” Rey fidgets in her bonds, her cheeks flushing even redder. “—P-Professor, I’m— my hands—”
> 
> “Shaking, I know.” He rises, seeming even taller now that she’s shackled over the tiny desk. It’s uncomfortable even twisting her head to look up at him now that he’s drawn himself up to his full height. “That’s the idea.”
> 
> “I don’t want to waste your things,” she murmurs.
> 
> He leans down to her again, his musky scent making her head spin as he tucks a loose tendril of hair behind her ear. “Then don’t.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Who's had an awful few days? 
> 
> Everyone!
> 
> Who deserves filth? 
> 
> (if your answer is _we do_ you're in the right place!)  
> 🖤🖤🖤

As soon as she gets back from the Professor’s room, her skin still warm from the fire-marble in his hearth, she flips through the pages of the volume he’s having her copy. Nowhere within is an empty rectangle like those in the five tomes locked somewhere far below.

It's a book, not a Book.

Rey scowls down at the slender volume, gnawing at her lower lip. It’s disappointing but unsurprising that he hasn’t handed her something so valuable. Something that might let her run from him.

Not that she necessarily _wants_ to run.

Her thighs are still sticky with desire, and she scrubs at herself with the bell of her dress. It was perverse but perfect getting herself off like that. Naked, on display for him.

And _he’d_ come, too. Spilling his seed into the kerchief, his cock thick with need. Hungering for her.

_Her_. Rey Nobody.

Rey skims her fingers over her breast, finding the spot where he’d kneaded her bare flesh. She’s still tender from his harsh ministrations, and slick pools in her folds as she remembers the husk of raw wanting in his voice.

_I could start now … take your flower all at once and get it over with._

He _will_ fuck her. He seems intent on it. As long as she doesn’t screw up on this thing that’s still before her, alien and unfinished.

It’s all the motivation she needs to clean up and return to her writing desk, trying to find her way back to the coal-eyed man one inked flourish at a time.

✒️✒️✒️

_Escape_.

The word tolls through Rey’s mind, a hammer striking bronze. Finding her as she labors over her transcribed copy of the volume the Professor has tasked her with completing. Nagging at her amid the solitary hours.

Unkar always took pains to remind her and the others of how lucky they were for the meager sanctuary he offered. His _protection_. The desert was always there waiting, surrounding the camp, stalking them like a predator. Preying on any outcasts, cracking the marrow from their sun-bleached bones.

There was no such thing as escape. It simply didn’t exist.

But now her mind finds its way to the Book Room over and over again, even though her feet can never seem to lead her back. The tower is labyrinthine; now that her door is left unlocked, she can find her way to both the corkscrewing stairs and the breathtaking night sky on the tower’s rooftop, but the way to the black door and what lies beyond it is somehow inaccessible.

The stone corridors are like the desert’s dunes. Shifting, changing, no matter how impossible that seems.

A world covered in perpetual night. A stone stronghold that floats above a glowing, gaseous sea. A new owner that makes her feral with lust.

Rey is beginning to grow accustomed to impossible things.

✒️✒️✒️

Most unbelievable of all is the day — or night, since in this timeless Age they’re the same — when she puts the finishing touches on her copy of the last page of the Professor’s book.

_One perfect duplicate_.

It’s not _truly_ perfect, of course. Hers lacks the confidence of the original, the knowing sweep of the lines — but each curve and dot is in its place.

It’s a pale copy, but hopefully it’ll be enough.

When the faceless female sending brings Rey’s next meal, she clears her throat awkwardly to catch its attention. She’s never spoken to the vaporous creatures before aside from murmured thanks, and faceless as the woman is, Rey isn’t entirely sure where to look. 

“Um, sorry … would you tell the Professor I’m done?”

She taps the neat stack of inked pages, and the sending nods before bustling back out.

Then she waits.

Her heart taps a nervous rhythm on her ribs at first. She’s so sure he’s going to walk through the door any moment, or that the sending will return to fetch her, that she doesn’t dare stir from the writing desk.

After a while she’s anxious enough to stand up and start pacing. Not that it helps.

She’d been assuming the Professor would at least offer an acknowledgement that she’d finished — and as the hours slip past, her restlessness turns to worry.

What if something’s happened to him?

She’s hardly self-sufficient; at least back in the desert she could’ve made her way if Unkar simply hadn’t woken up one morning. Here she’s thoroughly at the sendings’ mercy.

At _his_ mercy.

Eventually Rey ventures out of her quarters and finds her way back to the roof of the tower with a pillow and the blanket from her bed. The ethereal sky is a perfect distraction — and while the cold, flat stone isn’t particularly forgiving underneath her, it’s worth enduring to lie on her back and gaze up at the stars, as unfamiliar as the flowing alien script.

_Jedi_.

She’s never heard the word before, and it’s curious enough that surely she’d remember — like the time someone brought a silver coin from Tuanel, and it had been passed through through the market from hand to hand, merchants bickering among themselves to determine its worth.

At the time she’d gloomily realized the coin was worth far more than her own life. And surely Professor Ren hadn’t paid that handsomely for her — yet here she is all the same.

She holds her hands up, regarding them against the star-freckled sky. The callouses from digging and scraping and scouring sand are starting to fade, replaced by the manifestations of her new work.

She doesn’t mind the inkstains. They suit her.

They remind her of _him_ , too.

✒️✒️✒️

Rey doesn’t even feel herself drifting until the sending is standing over her, its nearness making her skin turn to goosebumps. It’s like low-grade static, a buzzing that isn’t exactly unpleasant but rouses her from her daze nonetheless. 

She slits her eyes, trying to see the translucent figure — and a frisson runs through her gut as she realizes the sending is beckoning for her to follow.

Her knees tremble as she bounds to her feet, abruptly and utterly awake. She bends to gather the bedding, but the sending shakes its head. As the diaphanous servant glides down the wide spiral stairs, Rey actually has to trot to keep up.

After all this waiting, now she’s to make haste. It’s maddening.

Her quickening heartbeat trips as they round a corner and suddenly everything is familiar. A door stands ajar, blue-green light spilling out into the black rock corridor, and Rey’s hands twist into the sides of her skirt.

“But I don’t have the manuscri—” Rey starts to hiss as the sending knocks on the cracked door.

“Enter.”

Then it’s too late, and all she can do is reluctantly step over the threshold.

The Professor’s study is as she remembers, its shelves filled with the most curious array of artifacts, no doubt treasures from each of the five Ages he guards.

_Kamino. Takodana. Mustafar. Naboo._

Nothing from Jakku, surely.

Save for her.

Professor Ren is standing on his low dais — and to Rey’s immense relief, her manuscript is there in his hands, the original copy of his book resting there on his sprawling desk. The man himself is wearing that black cloak, a dusty satchel resting on a table nearby.

The scent is there in the room. An aroma that makes her gut tug with unwelcome homesickness.

He’s been there. To her Age.

Of course. He’s been away, not ignoring her; he’s only just returned.

His silver-rimmed spectacles are perched on the bridge of his nose, and his dark gaze hits her like a physical blow, making her stumble over her own feet as he spares her a glance. 

“Have a seat.”

The small writing desk is there in the empty space before the low platform, and Rey slinks into its companion chair, grateful that there’s nothing on it, let alone anything she can break. All the more room for her nervously wringing hands.

The ink-scrawled pages crackle as he flips through them, not even looking away from her work as he swings the cloak from his shoulders with one gloved hand. A sending sweeps past Rey, and her master hands the apparition his duster, still without tearing his eyes away from her work.

The door clunks shut behind the enchanted servant as it retreats, and then her blood is singing in her ears.

“Have you been eating and sleeping as you should?”

A crease appears between his sharp brows as he asks the question — but surely it’s because he’s studying her work.

“Yes, thank you, Professor.”

For some reason, _that_ earns another look from him, and an approving tone: “You’re very polite.”

His voice is warm and deep like the canyons, intoxicating enough to make her head spin. “Th-Thank you, sir.”

“Your penmanship, on the other hand…”

The golden glow catching in her chest is instantly quashed by the way he shakes his head.

His booted footfalls are heavy as he moves to stand beside her. He sets the stack of papers on the writing desk before her — and she gasps quietly as he leans over her, resting one hand on the back of her chair.

His black-gloved forefinger grazes a spot on the page where her calligraphy visibly changes before planting his other hand on the desk. 

“What happened here?”

Rey doesn’t dare let her eyes wander from the spot. His huge body is practically caging hers, warming Rey without so much as touching her. His scent envelops her in a heady wave, the arid perfume of crushed minerals and the sweet tang of berries.

No, not berries. Ink.

“Rey,” he prompts quietly.

“I…” She remembers this page — but how can she possibly explain that every time she thinks of him, it makes her fingers tremble with uncontrollable desire? Gods, right now she doesn’t even dare do anything but keep them clutched together in her lap. He’s so _close_. “My hands, Professor — they shake sometimes.”

“I told you to let the sendings know if your room wasn’t warm enough.”

His voice is firm but not unkind. Not cruel, or cold.

Her core contracts with need, energy fizzing in her nerves as though he’s one of the sendings. “It’s not that, sir. I-I’m truly sorry—”

“Look at me.”

Reluctantly, she obeys — and a strangled squeak finds its way out of her throat.

He’s closer than she’d thought, so near to her that she could kiss him. His eyes burn into her, blacker than sin, igniting something in her core and her heart and her mind all at once. An inferno of longing.

“Mmm,” he hums, dropping his chin and peering into her. Studying Rey like he studied her writing. “Stress.”

“S-Sorry, Professor?” she manages, bemused as his full lips tighten. Can he sense the way her pussy is constricting in her belly, demanding to be filled with him? He hasn’t even touched her _there_ , but she needs him all the same.

“You’re nervous.” He smirks, creases forming at the outer corners of his eyes. “I can hear your heartbeat, pet.”

“I’m—” Rey swallows hard, almost choking on her own ragged breaths. He’s right, but there’s not a damn thing she can do about it; her heart only slams louder now that it knows he’s listening. “I mean, it’s just—”

“It’s alright.” Mercifully the Professor straightens and walks back to his desk, leaving Rey nearly panting with relief as his magnetic gaze releases her. He pulls off his gloves, setting them aside on his desk, and rolls his tunic sleeves up to his elbows. “To err is human.”

Her fingers throb, and she releases the stranglehold her hands have on each other, warring in her lap. Her skin is dappled with bloodless lace; they’re quaking as hard as she fears.

“Thank you, Professor Ren.”

The dark man chuckles softly as he rummages on his desk, collecting virgin paper, a metal fountain pen, a crystalline bottle of ink. “Don’t thank me just yet.”

Rey gulps, not trusting herself to ask why not.

“I don’t have the luxury of working in ideal conditions. That will obviously apply to you, too.” His gaze settles on her again, briefly. Just long enough to make sure she’s listening. “So, while I have the luxury of training you, I _will_.”

The nape of her neck thrills with warning as her master produces a short length of honey-brown rope from a desk drawer.

He returns, settling everything on the desk before her. All except the rope, which he winds between his bare hands, caressing it carefully.

Professor Ren’s eyes find hers again, and she stirs with the electric jolt of being _seen_ by him, silver-rimmed spectacles only enhancing his depthless gaze.

He isn't a sorcerer — but he’s no less imposing now that she knows him to be mortal. More or less.

But there’s a haunting sorrow in his eyes. Something that calls to her, lonely as a fox cry midnight.

“Give me your wrists,” he tells Rey, doubling the rope in his hands as he watches her.

She offers them up mutely, and he manacles her left wrist, wrapping the twin lines about her wrist firmly but not tight enough to cut off circulation. The knot he ties is elegant — but her breath hitches as he moves in front of the writing desk, kneeling and securing the rope to a hook or peg on the far side that she hadn’t noticed.

She hadn’t had reason to think of checking for such a thing.

“Pull,” he instructs her, and she does, her heart skipping at the short tether. The rope stretches the tiniest bit, the oiled fibers giving ever-so-slightly as she tugs, and though the desk rattles she can’t yank free. If anything, she’ll just upend the little table and anything that’s on it.

Like the bottle of ink that’s sitting there. Waiting for her to shatter it as she did its predecessor.

Her arse tingles at the remembrance.

There’s only enough play for her to sit hunched forward over the desk — and his long, cool fingers close around her other wrist, drawing it forward to bind like the first.

It’s not painful, just awkward. Which is surely his intention.

He sets the open book before her, and taps the inconsistent page. “I want a fresh copy of this.”

“But—” Rey fidgets in her bonds, her cheeks flushing even redder. “—P-Professor, I’m— my hands—”

“Shaking, I know.” He rises, seeming even taller now that she’s shackled over the tiny desk. It’s uncomfortable even twisting her head to look up at him now that he’s drawn himself up to his full height. “That’s the idea.”

“I don’t want to waste your things,” she murmurs.

He leans down to her again, his musky scent making her head spin as he tucks a loose tendril of hair behind her ear. “Then don’t.”

Danger glints in the shadows of his deep voice.

Rey shivers as he withdraws, and turns her attention to what he’s bid — but try as she might, she can’t cradle the engraved metal pen in her fingers without jittering.

It’s _him_. It’s been forever since that first day, when she was sitting here before him, and since then…

Time and again her scribbles come out wrong, and Rey’s rebellious heart only thuds faster. Being tied to this desk while he paces, looming over her, _watching_ her…

Finally she manages to make it a quarter of the way down the page without a mistake — and a sigh of relief is cresting in her lungs when silver glints in her peripheral vision.

Rey drags in a rasping breath, instinctively jerking back in her seat as she finds the sterling length of a dagger in his hand.

“Careful,” the raven-haired man warns as the crystal inkpot rattles ominously on her desktop. He nods to the pen in her hand, hovering precariously over the quarter-written page — and though Rey tries to move it inside, all her sharp movement does is dislodge the bead of ink that’s been gathering at its tip.

“ _Kriff_ ,” Rey hisses, hastily trying to blot up the wayward splotch with the sleeve of her dress, but the page is irrevocably blemished.

“Pity.”

Her jaw tightens until her teeth squeak. He sounds anything but sorry.

Professor Ren stands over her again as she shoves the sullied page aside, and she sneaks another glance at the silver knife in his hands. He’s holding the slender grip in one hand, balancing the point against the other as he turns it mindlessly in his fingers, like an old habit.

The blade’s edges must be dulled, but that’s a pale consolation. Her quickening blood whispers as he sets the metal sliver down on her desk, crowning the stack of clean papers.

He prowls into her peripheral vision, a handsome wraith. “Start again.” 

Whether from sheer repetition or from growing accustomed to her relentlessly racing heart she’s able to speed through the first few lines, her fluid strokes growing confident. Unwavering despite the dulled silver blade sitting there before her, a threat without even the decency of a veil.

“Stand up.”

He’s stopped directly behind her, so close that the desk rattles ominously as she twists her head in a vain effort to look up at him. “But Professor Ren—”

“I didn’t ask for backtalk.” His huge hands nudge against the back of her dress, warming her through the thin fabric as he catches hold of the backrest. “Up, Rey. _Now_.”

She leans forward as she rises, and the chair slips backward on the dark stone floor as her master moves it out of the way, letting her straighten her legs.

The wooden seat behind her creaks with weight — and then his knees are pressed against the backs of Rey’s, his hands swallowing her hips and flooding them with heat. “Back down.”

“Master, I—”

“ _Sit_ ,” he snaps.

Her haunches drop into his lap, and she holds the desk steady as he hitches the chair closer beneath it. His body is hot and hard against her, sculpted like marble, and a squeak forces itself through her lips as one of his hands skims down her leg, fisting her skirt and pulling it up past her knees.

She leans on the desk, a squeak vibrating through her clamped-shut lips as the professor’s hand finds her thighs and nudges between them. “Spread.”

Her pussy clenches with sickening longing as he splays her over him until her slippers graze the outsides of his knee-high boots, cautiously pulling the desk closer once she’s settled.

“Begin again.”

It feels precarious leaning forward to tug a fresh sheet of paper from beneath the dulled, cruelly thin blade — but then the Professor’s hand slips forward from her hip, his arm wrapping around her waist and steadying her.

His scent enfolds her as his other hand settles on her bare knee, and he traces soft circles on her skin with his thumb.

It’s distracting. 

It’s _torture_.

His abyssal voice rumbles through him. “Rey.”

“Yes, Professor,” she says quickly. He _must_ know the effect his shallow strokes are having on her, the way she’s squirming as she tries to get used to the curious sensation of sitting on his lap. His warmth is bringing a corresponding heat to her arse and thighs, and her fingernails nip into the palm of her free hand as she tries to block out the craving.

“You’ve stained your sleeve.” His words buzz into the curve of her neck, and her scalp prickles as he nuzzles into her hair, inhaling.

Rey’s heart stutters as his hand moves to the knife.

The bell of her skirt tumbles off her knees, fabric whispering against her shins as trades his spectacles for the thin sliver and moves it out of sight behind her shoulder. His other hand rises from her waist to catch her upper sleeve. “I don’t hear the sound of writing.”

Fabric tears and her bodice jerks against her ribs — and the Professor’s fingers brush against the back of her bare shoulder as he tugs again, ripping the sleeve off her dress.

He peels the fabric off her like a rind, baring her arm to the chill air. It’s all Rey can do to keep moving, desperately trying to copy the page as he caresses her.

Mm,” he hums, steel clinking against wood as he sets the metal stiletto back on her desk. He taps it with a forefinger. “Usually I use this to open my letters, but using it to open your dress is infinitely more satisfying.”

Rey gasps, stiffening as he hitches her hips back into the curve of his lap, anchoring her about the waist as he rouses beneath her. 

His other hand roves higher, cupping her breast and kneading her until she gasps. The nib of her pen rattles against the neck of the glass inkpot as he teases the sensitive skin above her neckline.

“You’re so tiny,” he murmurs, lifting the swell of Rey’s tit as though he’s admiring her body. She doesn’t dare even try to glance at him now; his touch is beautiful agony, unlocking her mind and body at once as she scribbles furiously, a prisoner of his lap.

Her feet twist around his calves, depraved hunger rooting itself in the bottom half of her body as she fights to keep control of the top. His fingers scoop under the fabric between her breasts, fumbling — and with a sharp tug the twill tape bow comes undone.

His groan as he tugs the dress open to bare her breasts makes her stiffen, desire coiling around her spine. Her nipples ache as they harden, and soft, guttural sounds tear out of her as he plucks her like a lyre.

It feels cursedly good as he cradles her tits, claiming her skin and pushing his hips up to meet hers, his rasping breaths heating the nape of her neck.

“Professor, how am I supposed to write like this?” Rey pleads as his length presses into the curve of her arse, rock-hard and ravenous.

“Divorce your mind from your body. This—” He rubs her tits so urgently that the pen turns to lead in her hand, a needy groan rattling her ribs. “—is mine. And I’m going to amuse myself with it as this—” He releases her, fingers skating up to her temples like a playful breeze. “—remains occupied with the task at hand.”

Is he truly trying to teach her, or simply amuse himself with tormenting her?

In the end it doesn’t matter. It’s his world, his Age. She’s merely his servant.

Not that the position is without its pleasures, it seems.

“Now…” The Professor catches her wrist, guiding her pen back to the inkpot, steadying her as she wets the nib and taps off the excess. “Keep working.”

Rey clutches the rope in her free hand, the gentle bite of the fibers a curious relief. He’s right; she _can_ begin to push the sensations apart, holding them separately in her mind as she stares at the open book. It’s altogether easy to lose her place in the alien text, though, and she scowls down at the splayed pages, gnawing her lower lip as the Professor returns to fondling her breasts.

“Where were you?” she blurts out, the words hoarse with apprehension as his hands slide down the clothed plane of her belly.

“Away.”

Rey rolls her eyes, wryly amused. “Yes, Professor. I can smell home on you.”

“ _This_ is your home now, little one,” he reminds her silkily. One hand finds the hot rise of her mound — but the fabric is stretched taut between her parted thighs, denying his attempts to claim her.

“Sir?” she gasps as he reaches again for the letter-opener.

“These dresses don’t suit you. And more importantly—” The dark man rucks her skirt up over her knees once more, gathering the fabric in his fist. “—they don’t let me touch you as I’d like.”

He loops a pinch of her skirt over the tip of the metal spike, grunting as he shoves it through the fabric — and the growling rip makes Rey twitch back into the crook of his shoulder.

“Easy, pet.” The Professor sets his letter-opener aside. “I’m not going to hurt you.”

His massive hands tear a slit in the side of her skirt from hip to hem, parting the fabric as easily as if it were paper.

“I can’t do this,” Rey gasps as cool air finds her bare leg — but there’s nowhere to run. She can only struggle, pinned between her owner and the writing desk. “I can’t do both at once.”

“Don’t you want this?”

Fuck, he’s like cinnamon honey, sweetness and fire as he touches her for the first time. He’s surprisingly gentle, taking his time as his cyclopean palm strays up her thigh, devouring her an inch at a time.

Reluctantly, she nods.

“Then you can endure it.” Professor Ren presses his lips to the curve of her neck, swiftly — and that’s it, the first time she’s ever been kissed, the roughness of his stubble and the satin-softness of lips entwining in an inferno of sensations. “Give me a page, and I’ll give you an orgasm.”

Her fingers are numb, droplets splattering mindlessly from the tip of her pen as he presses into her crux, dragging her torn dress along the length of her slit until the fabric is soaked. “W-Will you give me your cock, too, Professor?”

“Not today, pet,” he chuckles quietly, tweaking one of her nipples as though he’s amused by the question. “Now give me that perfect page and I’ll make you see stars.”

“Yes, sir,” Rey murmurs. “Thank you, sir.”

Another kiss, this one printed into her hair. “Pretty manners from my pretty slave girl.”

She settles another clean sheet of paper before her, exhaling in slow, deliberate rushes to control the overwhelming bliss he elicits. His thumb finds the hard bud of her clit through the sopping fabric — and he flicks in counterpoint to his fingers tracing the line of her crease, moving relentlessly but only whisper-soft.

“You were a good investment,” Professor Ren breathes, the words tickling the shell of her ear. “I swindled that man out of a diamond buying you.”

That shouldn’t make her wet. It should make her angry, outraged. 

Yet there’s another gush of warmth between her folds as his teeth graze her earlobe, a longing to feel him not just against her but inside her, filling her with life.

“Good girl,” he rumbles. His hips flex under her thigh, urging his trouser-bound cock up against her arse, and then he’s cupping her breasts again, groping her more brutally. Reclaiming her. “You’re doing such a good job, keep going…”

He’s like a sandstorm, surrounding her in his inescapable embrace — and finally Rey surrenders to the shadowy pleasure.

She wants to be ravaged by him.

In the midst of the tempest, somehow, she finishes copying the page. The heavy metal pen drops from her nerveless fingers with a thunk, and she clutches at her rope bonds. “Professor—”

“I see. Let’s take a look.”

He leans forward, fingers slowing at her cunt as he traps her down and inspects her handiwork.

“Yes … I think that’s sufficient.”

“Thank you, Professor Ren,” she gushes in relief, sagging against the desk. “Pl-Please. If I might be excused—”

“Of course not.” He sounds stern, indignant. “Not until you’ve come.”

“Truly, sir, I don’t need—”

“I’m a man of my word, Rey,” he growls, and he paws at her tits until she arches her back, pushing back to meet him. He grinds the drenched fabric of her skirt into her folds, his fingers working at her crevice as she rocks her hips to meet him. “I promised you an orgasm, so you’re not leaving my lap until you’ve had one.”

“But I didn’t ask for it,” Rey whimpers, straining into his touch as it roughens. “You don’t need to do this for me—”

“I’m not, sweetheart.” He nuzzles into the sweep of her neck, his stubble turning her skin to gooseflesh. “This is for _me_. To assure your loyalty.” She gasps as he strokes her clit through the torn, sodden dress. “To remind you that that loyalty will be rewarded.” He pushes into her hollow harder, cloth-swathed fingertips parting her where she’s yielding. “To take what’s mine.”

The Professor yanks the front of her dress down even more, his fingers skirling over her smooth flesh as his hand works harder between her legs. He’s already stirring her to bliss, meeting her with equal force as she surges against him.

“Please—”

“Rey, the next sounds that pass your lips had better be moans of genuine pleasure,” he snaps. “Show me you understand.”

She clamps her lips together, and nods.

“Good girl.” Another kiss pressed into her hair, his tone softer now that she’s not defying him.

She hated the rope cuffs at first but now she’s grateful to be tethered, caught, held fast as the Professor’s own hand moves between her thighs. Unrelenting.

Rapture steals up on her quickly, faster once the huge man grazes the nape of her neck with his teeth. One moment she’s there on the edge, then his thick fingers are stroking her into ecstasy, oblivion shattering through her as she cries out.

“Good girl,” he croons. “ _Very_ good.”

“Thank you, Professor,” Rey gasps, shuddering with pleasure as he wipes her flooded sex with a clean fold of her dress. “B-But what about you, sir?”

Her body rises faintly as his erection throbs under her arse. “You’re a clever girl, what do you suggest?”

“You could touch yourself again,” she manages shyly, grateful to not have to utter the words to his perfect face. “As you did before.”

“I could,” he echoes — and she’s not sure if the pensive note in his voice is genuine or gently teasing. “But I’d want something else to make it special.”

Rey knits her brow in consternation. “Not me, sir?”

“Not your virginity. Not yet.”

_Not yet_.

She shivers with delight.

“Hmm.” His fingers dance at the small of her back, and she knows when he’s freed himself from his trousers when he heaves a groaning breath, and the hiss of skin on skin reaches her ears. “I’d need some lubrication.”

Rey’s raw pussy clenches, and she grits her teeth, almost nauseous with envy. “I’ve plenty to spare, Professor.”

“ _Do_ you now.”

Her body surges as he peels back her dress — and she yelps as the molten heat of his fingers finds her cunt.

“Yes,” he mutters, his erection throbbing between their bodies as he explores her wrecked slit. He swirls his fingertips through her sticky folds. “Oh yeah, this’ll be perfect.”

Rey sobs in barely-contained disappointment as he pulls away, hissing into her hair as his hand moves behind hers and sloppy sounds filling the study. She clutches at the ropes, shivering as he pauses to dip his fingertips into her again, probing only the very edge of her and coming away thoroughly slick.

Soon his breaths are harsh, his movements sharp with desire. He snatches up her ripped sleeve, and then both of his hands are behind her back as his body shakes with a primal groan.

One arm lashes around her torso in the next instant, his strong fingers catching her chin and tilting her head back. His temple presses into hers, and he draws her close as he pumps a few more times, then stills.

Rey huddles in his lap, catching her breath — and he tucks himself back into his pants, refastening them before helping her to her feet. The ropes are off her wrists a few deft flicks later, and then she straightens, sighing in relief as she stretches her back.

Professor Ren’s hair is tousled, and there’s a pink flush to his cheeks, but his eyes gleam dark with triumph. He resettles his spectacles on the bridge of his nose, studying her work again.

Only as Rey waits does she realize what a state of disarray she’s in, and she hurriedly moves to tie her dress shut.

“I didn’t say you could do that,” the Professor remarks without looking, and her nipples tingle with awareness as her hands fall to her sides.

Finally he finishes his examination, and his gaze locks on hers again. “Very good. You can get dressed now.”

“Thank you, Professor,” Rey mumbles, hastily making herself as presentable as possible — but his mouth twists with distaste as she finishes.

“That design was a mistake. I’ll send over something more suitable for you to wear.”

“If it please you, sir.”

“It does please me.” His eyes wander over her, greedily drinking her in. “ _You_ please me, Rey.”

It feels strange to smile. “Thank you, Professor Ren.”

He hesitates — and for a moment she thinks he’s going to move closer, claim her lips with his own, but he only offers a curt nod. “That’ll be all.”

The dark man snaps his fingers and the door to the corridor opens, revealing two sendings waiting on the threshold. One hurries forward to begin straightening the mess of strewn-about papers while the other obediently waits at the threshold — to guide her back to her quarters, she realizes with a dull jolt.

Of course.

“Yes, sir,” she offers, then hurries out.

_Escape_.

The word finds Rey again as the translucent spirit-thing conducts her back through the labyrinth of dark corridors — and her stomach swoops sickeningly.

Never before has something so seemingly straightforward felt so utterly confusing. Or so wrong.


	4. Traversing Takodana

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Sit on your bed,” he orders her — and she does, slippers dangling a few inches above the smooth stone floor.
> 
> He nudges her knees apart, and she whimpers, cunt clenching with blissful awakening as he runs his huge hands up the inside of her bare thighs. He nudges her skirts aside and then she’s gasping as his thumbs find the creases of her legs, stroking her hungrily along the edges of her panties.
> 
> The Professor’s spicy, honeyed aroma fills her nose as he leans closer.
> 
> “This, Rey.” His full lips barely move, and though her mouth waters with desperate longing he doesn’t kiss her. “This is how you can serve me. By being ready for me whenever I need you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> How we doing, Team Trash Fire? 🔥🔥🔥
> 
> Welcome back, I've missed y'all!
> 
> As per usual, check the CWs -- and watch that chapter count, too, it might be rising soon 👀

Rey doesn’t think of escape again until Professor Ren shows her the anisopter.

She can’t make heads or tails of it at first, and simply scowls in horror at the sending who’s holding it. It doesn’t even look like a proper garment.

Even without looking away she can feel the Professor peering at her through his crystal spectacles — and she feels a sudden, rueful sympathy for his books. It isn’t easy to be fixed in his obsidian stare.

“What’s wrong?”

“It’s just…” Rey gestures to the thing, not entirely sure where to begin. The simple dresses that appear in the wardrobe freshly laundered are easy enough to work out, but this is incomprehensible. “How do I, er…?”

“Oh, of course.” The understanding in his voice coaxes her into looking up, and mercifully there’s no judgement on his carved-marble countenance. “The sending will help you.”

Then he simply turns his back.

Rey blinks at the vast plain of his shoulders, the way the ripples in the dark linen shirt move like currents. His charcoal trousers are higher than might’ve been the fashion back in her own world, but they’re complimented by his black suspenders, more fashion than function. He’s perfectly fit, the lines of iron muscles evident beneath his neatly tailored clothes — and she doesn’t realize how greedily she’s staring until his glossy hair twitches, tendrils shifting like rivulets of ink as he turns his head.

“Is everything going alright back there?”

The sending is plucking at her sleeve, probably has been all this time — and Rey’s fingers stumble at the neckline of her dress as she yanks at the twill tape bow.

“Y-Yes, sorry, Professor, just a minute—”

She yanks the fabric over her head, and then she’s naked save for her slippers, skin prickling and nipples hardening painfully in protest of the tower’s brisk air.

Perhaps the tall man is listening for the whisper of the fabric hitting the floor, because he turns forward again and unhooks his glasses from around his ears, busying himself with cleaning the lenses on the front of his shirt.

The sending knows how the strange black garment works, layers interconnecting and enfolding her body like petals. Knickers that can be unsnapped along the seam of her slit, and a corset that wraps around her torso under her breasts. An outer layer that slips on over her shoulders, covering her from her wrists to the small of her back — and a long, narrow panel lined with twin rows of vertical buttons that covers her tits.

The skirt is a succession of layered panels that can be easily fastened up about her hips to bare her thighs and everything beneath. Altogether, though, when done up fully it’s surprisingly modest — and the Professor prowls about her, his elegant fingers grazing her body as he tightens a strap here and straightens a button there.

“This, sir?” She goggles down at herself. “ _ This _ is the new style of dress you want me to wear?”

“Yes.” He studies her. “You have a problem with that?”

Rey gestures to herself helplessly, and her lower lip erupts with pain as she gnaws it anxiously. It’s so …  _ fussy _ . “I can’t understand how I can serve you any better in this than what I usually wear.”

“Leave us.”

Somehow the sending knows he’s referring to her and bustles out, shutting the door with a comforting thunk. It’s never locked anymore — and though Rey knows she shouldn’t be self-conscious when it comes to the anonymous sendings, being alone with the Professor makes her stomach lurch and her head spin with excitement.

That’s when everything interesting happens.

“Sit on your bed,” he orders her — and she does, slippers dangling a few inches above the smooth stone floor.

He nudges her knees apart, and she whimpers, cunt clenching with blissful awakening as he runs his huge hands up the inside of her bare thighs. He nudges her skirts aside and then she’s gasping as his thumbs find the creases of her legs, stroking her hungrily along the edges of her panties.

The Professor’s spicy, honeyed aroma fills her nose as he leans closer.

“This, Rey.” His full lips barely move, and though her mouth waters with desperate longing he doesn’t kiss her. “This is how you can serve me. By being ready for me whenever I need you.”

His trousers are straining — but he moves away as she reaches for him, teasing her with a low, throaty chuckle that makes her grind her molars with thwarted lust.

“Patience.”

The Professor moves to her desk, where he’s draped his hooded cloak over the back of her chair, but the trailing fabric that he lifts away is smaller. Lighter. It’s a cloak, but not for him.

She hops to her feet, the lust falling away beneath a thrill of shock as he moves toward her. “Are we going somewhere, sir?”

He watches her sternly as he attaches the cloak to her dress, buttoning the cascading fabric to her shoulders. “I’m running low on boards and cords.”

Rey scowls for a few long moments before the answer comes to her. “Takodana?”

“Very good,” the Professor hums — and the way that his lips curve in a crooked smile makes her heart stumble.

“And you’re bringing me?” She hears the giddiness in her voice, but can’t stop herself from adding, “Really?”

“Evidently.” His smile fades like sunlight. “But I have rules. And this is the only warning I will give you.”

Her lips snap together with an audible pop, the golden rush in her gut cooling with warning.

He’s completely serious — and she steps back, tripping on the hem of her new cloak as she settles herself on the edge of the bed again.

The Professor puts his hands in his pockets, watching her solemnly for a few seconds, but he must be convinced she’s paying attention because he goes on, “Thus far you’ve proven a good investment. Hopefully you continue on in that vein, but I won’t delude myself.”

He sighs heavily, carding his graceful fingers through his black hair.

“I’m sure you’ve thought of running away — or maybe it’ll occur to you when everything’s there before you, and there’s no tower, no locked doors to hold you back.”

She lifts her shoulder, echoing the same words that’ve always rung through her mind when the notion occurred to her: “Where would I possibly go?”

His dark brows twitch higher, as though it didn’t occur to him that she’d say that.

“All the same,” he continues after a moment. “I told you what I prize most.”

“Loyalty,” Rey murmurs.

The Professor nods, his dark eyes smoldering into her like coals.

“If you run, I will not chase you. If you think you’ve learned anything about my craft, you have not. Without my protection, you will find yourself alone in an alien world — one that may not be altogether perilous, but without an experienced guide, may prove fatal to you.” He pauses, letting his words sink in. “Do you understand?”

Rey nods, startled by his unforgiving words.

Either her wordless gesture or her expression must convince him, because his voice softens. “I don’t mean to frighten you, only ensure that you understand the consequences of any actions you may wish to take.”

“I don’t think I’ve broken any rules here with you, Professor.” Her heart’s thudding with sickening force, like it wants to convince him. “I don’t mean to anywhere else, either.”

He laughs but it’s a twisted sound. Not mirth but something else.

“It’s one thing to say that now. Here. It’s another when it’s all there before you.”

Outrage sparks in her gut. The dark man seems so sure that she’s going to try to bolt that she can’t help but lift her chin in defiance — the kind of thing that would surely earn her a backhand from Unkar.

Staring her master in the eyes would’ve won her another blow, but she looks up at the Professor, meeting his gaze simply. Openly.

“You will stay by me at all times. Do not speak unless I speak to you first.”

She nods, and his lips curve faintly.

“You can speak now, pet.”

“Yes, Professor,” she mumbles, smiling shyly, too. The word still makes heat bloom in her sex — and she fights the urge to drop her gaze to his trousers, tantalizingly close to eye level. “Er … anything else?”

“Yes. Keep your eyes, your ears open. Taste the air.” It’s curiously poetic, and his expression is serious; he isn’t mocking her. There’s a sort of reverence in his gaze, something faraway that makes Rey think he’s half-caught in memories. “Nothing will ever equal that feeling of taking your first steps into another world.”

“You mean—” She swallows hard, head spinning as she remembers the cave in the desert. The wind whistling through the fan canyons, tickling her ears as the sickly-sweet flavor rolls over her tongue and the strength evaporates from her body. His steady embrace as he cradles her close, keeping her from falling. “—I’m to be awake this time?”

The Professor nods. “Does that scare you?”

“A little,” she admits. Her vision squares as she frowns up at him. “ _ Should _ I be afraid?”

He laughs softly. “No.”

Rey hopes he’ll hold out his hand, but he doesn’t. The tall man only moves backward, finding his way to the chair. He lifts his black traveling cloak and his satchel is there underneath.

The two crisp raps at the door startle her to her feet — but it’s only the male-presenting sending that usually attends the Professor, carrying a satchel like the Professor’s and a pair of knee-high boots.

Black, of course.

The Sending offers her the boots, and the Professor nods to them, swinging his cloak on over his shoulder. The Sending is carrying something else, too — and Rey’s breath catches in her throat as she sees the Professor’s filtration mask.

It gleams at her in the low light, ink black and liquid-silver chrome.

She can’t remember the first day she saw him in the junker’s bazaar, but she remembers the sight of him tugging it from his head to reveal a shock of dark hair and a pale, dour face.

He tucks the helmet under his arm, glancing back at her one last time before unhooking his glasses from his face and tucking them away in his bag. “Put them on.”

The boots, at least, are easy enough to figure out — and as she finishes the final fastenings around her calves, she straightens up to find the sending proffering the second bag.

“For me?”

“You should get used to carrying it.”

There’s something inside, heavy and smooth and cool to the touch.

A mask.

She can see her shocked face reflected in the metal, lines of sterling intercutting the onyx planes. It looks like  _ his _ , only more refined. Elegant where his looks brutish and brooding.

His eyes only meet hers for a few heartbeats. “Let me know if I need to adjust it.”

Then his dark hair swings, and his fallen-angel face disappears beneath the mask.

✒✒✒

She follows him.

First in donning her mask — which molds against her face, as perfectly suited to her body as the boots the sending brought. Then in shadowing him like a wraith, following him out of the room, down the stone corridor to the corkscrewing stairs.

The mask is a work of incomprehensible wizardry, adjusting dynamically to compensate for her panicked breaths, providing a steady flow of cool air over her perspiration-beaded skin. Even in the corridor’s dim light she can see perfectly, but caution still makes her trail her fingertips along the wall as they descend.

Already she knows where they’re going.

The Book Room.

Then the dark doorway is there before them, the bright sending emerging to pass through the Professor’s body.

Suddenly, as the Age Books are there before them, it’s all too much.

Rey tugs the mask from her face, gasping as her heart drums relentlessly.

“What’s wrong?”

His voice is cold, rasping, but there’s tenderness beneath the inhumanity of his biofiltration mask. He’s wearing his gloves again — and even through the heavy fabric she can feel his warmth as he takes her hand, pressing her fingers with a reassuring insistence.

She peers up at him, but his black lenses are impenetrable. “You drugged me before. When you brought me here from my world —from Jakku.”

A long pause. Then a single word, so harsh with static that for a few seconds it doesn’t even register: “Yes.”

“Why?”

Another hesitation. “I was worried you wouldn’t be compliant.”

“That’s all?” She gulps nervously but her throat is dry with panic as she regards the five tomes on their stately pedestals. “I mean, I’m not … I won’t go mad or anything, will I?”

A soft chuffing. Is he laughing? “No.”

He squeezes her hand once more before releasing her.

“Put your helmet back on.”

“Yes, Professor.”

“Good girl.”

The helmet’s bound to take some getting used to, but it makes her old goggles look like children’s toys. Even here, as the fire marble chandelier glows to life over their heads, she can see the warm tones of light filling the room like a welcoming blaze; the edges of the lens are shadowy, but the effect is easy enough to ignore.

The filtration tech is a marvel, too. The scents of pulverized rock and spices find her nose as the Professor moves toward the second Book from the left. Fully cloaked and masked he cuts an impressive figure, just as eye-catching but altogether different than he looks without them.

He opens the book and lifts a crystal reader tablet from beside it, settling it over the waiting rectangle. Emerald ink bleeds across the page as though from within, filling the empty frame — and Rey watches, wonderstruck, as things emerge, skimming beyond the crystal viewer like they’re gazing through a flying window.

She knows the words, even if she’s never actually seen them before.

_ Trees _ .

The Professor’s probably watching, but she can’t look away. There are so many of them, it’s like a green sea.

_ Sea _ . That’s another thing Rey’s never seen before — but then, as though to contradict her, a flat blue plane swings into view.

A river? No, it’s wider than that. A pond, maybe, or a lake.

Such things exist on Jakku, too — they’re simply barren aboveground, pitted scars in the land where, if travelers are lucky, the water has only retreated a few few feet under the earth and not disappeared altogether.

The window circles a rocky plateau, a place where the treetops part to reveal a clearing overlooking the valley.

And then it  _ keeps _ circling. As though it’s waiting.

“Take my hand,” the Professor rasps through his helmet.

She’s grateful for the mask as his fingers find hers again, because she’s been too distracted to notice him pulling off one of his gloves. The touch of his skin is like being kissed by fire, and she murmurs as he leads her hand to the crystal viewer.

Her palm tingles as it hovers over the rectangular crystal, but he’s there to bolster her. Not forcing her hand lower, but threading his fingers through hers. Waiting until she’s ready.

And finally, after a few long moments, she is — and she lowers her hand to rest on the crystal viewer.

✒✒✒

Or rather, where it should be — because in the next moment there’s nothing under her fingers.

Her hand falls to her side, fingers still entwined with the Professor’s, clinging tighter as she stares at everything before them.

It didn’t feel like moving, but they’re standing in the forest clearing; that’s as clear as it is unthinkable. Unfathomable.

Simply putting her hand on a book shouldn’t do this … but then, it hadn’t been an ordinary book she’d touched, but a  _ kormahn _ .

The Book of Takodana.

And now they’re standing in it.

Instinctively she wants to rip off the helmet, look on it with her own eyes — but the visor reacts perfectly, adjusting so that it only feels like looking through glass. Together with the constant flow of air over her face, she’s surprised to find that she doesn’t feel separated from her surroundings. Not really.

And the scent — no, the  _ flavor _ . Her body reacts instinctively, dragging in deeper breaths as her mouth waters. He wasn’t just being poetic; it’s not merely an aroma that hangs in the air but something that permeates it instead, sharp and sweet, like the fresh salads the sendings bring for some of her meals.

Everything’s so  _ bright _ , her head aches with it.

Then Professor Ren untwines her fingers from hers. She wants to think that he’s lingering before he pulls away, but that’s probably only a wish.

“This is just a quick trip, there and back,” he tells her, his deep baritone nearly unrecognizable through his helmet’s distortion as he pulls his other glove back on.

Rey frowns up at him. Can he see her through the mask? “ _ There, _ Professor?”

His goggles shine with light from the cloud-dotted sky as he turns his chin — and she follows it to find the strange building nestled in the trough of the valley, sprouting at the water’s edge like an angular, alien plant. From here it stands out in pale contrast to the color-saturated landscape, ghostly under the brilliant sky.

“The nunnery.” She can feel his gaze as he looks back at her. “Remember my rules.”

_ Stay by my side. Don’t speak unless spoken to.  _

_ Keep your eyes and ears open. _

She nods.

“Good. Let’s go.”

✒✒✒

Rey feels like she’s dreaming as they follow the gnarled path that wends through the forest. The Jakku sky was never so blue, even on its clearest days; the clouds are puffy things that hurry across the vault as though they’ve somewhere important to be, scrolling through the gaps in the branches and out of sight.

And the trees … they’re astonishing, ever moving, the breezes constantly whispering through the leaves, branches swaying, twigs rasping. A thousand insects raising a symphony that has neither beginning nor end, a river of sound. 

The scent of the world enfolds her, new and unfamiliar notes rising to the fore: fruits, flowers, things she can’t recognize or name. All of it welcoming her — or simply not trying to leach the life from her body the way Jakku always did.

A cool ribbon scrawls its way down her cheek, and she moves to swipe it away but only succeeds in smacking her hand against the helmet’s visor. It’s ridiculous; there’s no reason to be crying, but the helmet magically scours it away in a rush of warm air, saving her the mortification of sniffling too loudly.

The Professor walks ahead of her on the narrow trail, turning back every so often to check that she’s still following. The footpath is well-worn, a simple dirt track marred with roots and stones that are altogether ready to trip her if her mind wanders.

But there’s nowhere she’d rather be than here, following the mysterious Professor, descending into the valley as the water ripples on the far side of the trees like dark blue glass.

✒✒✒

At the bottom of the valley the path joins with a larger one, the slender ribbon dovetailing with a rutted track that runs around the edge of the lake. It’s so well hidden by overgrowth that even a few steps away from the trailhead it’s impossible to see — and her heart pounds more urgently as they move on, the nunnery’s odd silhouette emerging through the trees ahead of them.

From above it had seemed smallish, perhaps the size of the bazaar on one of its busiest days, if admittedly taller. Rey can see how wrong she was as they approach; the edifice is massive, towers looming far above the imposing walls. The interconnected buildings cluster around an inner courtyard, all of it looking like it’s been carved from a single piece of primordial stone.

As they emerge from the treeline, a flutter of movement catches her eye between the wide-open gates. Pennants and flags in vibrant colors flutter in the boisterous wind — and as Rey’s gaze wanders lower, she sees something that makes her stumble on the uneven ground.

_ People _ .

Of course there would be other people here. He’d warned her not to speak to anyone else, even if they spoke to her first; it’s not as though he was ordering her not to talk to the trees.

Rey wishes the Professor would take her hand, but he doesn’t. He simply twitches his head toward her, checking that she’s beside him as they stride into the nunnery’s shadow.

In many respects the nunnery’s open courtyard is like the bazaar, a maze of tent flies anchored to the ancient, mossy stones, shielding the array of wares from the sun. An orderly labyrinth of tables cluster beneath, laden with everything from vibrant bushels of plants and flowers to bundles of rope, and rectangles of something thicker than paper.

Rey stays beside the Professor like a shadow, taking it in as he’s bid. They draw a few curious glances, though they’re far from the only travelers wearing face wrappings or goggles that obscure their features.

The nuns are easy to identify in their matching wrapped dresses, hair bound back by elaborately embroidered scarves. The language they speak is incomprehensible to her ears, but Professor Ren seems to speak it as easily as her language. For their part, the nuns seem to understand his voice through the warbling voice-changer — and though Rey may not understand the words, if there’s one thing she’d understand in any universe it’s the cadence of bargaining.

Everyone seems well about their business, to the point where Rey’s attention begins to drift, seeking out the elaborate carvings that embellish the weathered architecture. There’s so much to look at, to smell, to  _ sense _ , she could drown in it all if she doesn’t anchor herself.

Then her gaze finds the two men lurking at the edge of the courtyard, and her hackles prick with warning.

They’re lurking in a wedge of the shadows; the cherry of the rolled smoke that they’re passing back and forth glows red as they inhale, gleaming in the dark like a single, baleful eye. The smoke dissipates in the breezy air like passing thoughts — and though they seem to be deeply engaged in conversation with each other, every time she looks away she can see them in her peripheral vision, their heads turning. Finding them again.

It doesn’t matter where she and the Professor move throughout the bazaar. Every time her head is turned elsewhere, the two men stare at them with naked interest.

Rey pretends to busy herself with looking at a spray of orange flowers. They’re dressed entirely too neatly for these surrounding, their rakish clothes unsullied by grass stains or dust — and as she looks around, even a few of the nuns are casting worried glances at the men.

Rey’s gut flips. Something’s wrong here.

The Professor is too distracted with his own business to notice they’re being watched — but his rules explicitly forbade her from speaking to him without being addressed first.

What’ll happen if she’s wrong?

She doesn’t dare risk saying anything. Not now. She could just be paranoid after living in the tower so long, with only Professor Ren and his sendings for company.

Surely their masks and cloaks are curious enough to merit interest, but there’s a hunger about the pair — and more troublingly, the way the nuns appear spooked by them.

But as the Professor concludes his business and mutters a curt, “Let’s go,” the man who’s holding the glowing butt tosses it down in the grass, squashing it with his boot as a nearby nun glares but says nothing.

The Professor’s long strides carry him to the mouth of the courtyard before Rey can catch up.

As she draws even with him, she does the only thing she can think of, and slips her hand into his.

“Rey—” he growls, his voice sharp with censure even through the modifier, but she squeezes.  _ Hard _ .

Thankfully he seems to understand, and his fingers tighten on hers. “What is it?”

“Behind us,” she says quietly.

“I see.” His strides lengthen until Rey almost has to trot to keep up. “Don’t look back.”

As soon as she hears the words, the urge to look back she becomes almost inescapable — and she clutches his hand tighter to quell the impulse.

The Professor doesn’t turn, but the way his body goes rigid as they cross the flat plain between the nunnery and the treeline makes her think that he’s somehow monitoring the men.

She can feel them there. Following. Waiting.

“On the way down, did you notice the wroshyr trees —the big ones by the water?”

Rey nods. They’re impossible to miss, their trunks wide and gnarled with diverging roots like living waterfalls. 

“Good.”

Oh gods — they’re going to have to hide.

Blood rushes through her ears. “Professor, are we in danger?”

“ _ I _ may be. I’m sure they won’t have any truck with you, sweetheart.”

That’s even worse.

Acid stings her ragged breaths as the trees overshadow them, fury crawling up her throat in an unvoiced scream.

The undergrowth is thick this low in the valley, framing the edges of the trail like emerald walls. Though this part of the trail is wider, the dense vegetation envelops them almost instantly — and even before she’s ready the Professor tugs her to the side of the rutted track, shoving a huge leafy blade aside and pushing her into the hollow behind it.

“Go. Now.”

She darts into the empty space behind the colossal leaf, twigs and fallen leaves snapping noisily under feet — but one of the massive trees is there beside her, and she scampers into the hollow refuge beneath its roots. This close to the trunk the largest of them stand like living walls, and Rey tucks herself into the crook of one, shoulder blades pressed against the rough bark and ground chill beneath her arse.

Professor Ren is right behind her, and he throws himself down in the narrow alcove of space, caging her body with his own. She stares past him, wide-eyed, at the ridgeline of the root that’s shielding them, heart slamming in her chest like it’s trying to betray them both.

Just as she thinks she might’ve been mistaken, jumping at shadows, the mutter of voices finds its way to her ears. 

Tiny rocks on the path crunch under the soles of boots — and she tries to slow her breathing but her pulse only quickens rebelliously, drowning out everything but the rush of the wind through the branches.

They stay hunkered like that for a long time, unmoving, before Professor Ren’s head turns toward her again, chrome tracks around his mask’s shadow-black visor glinting in the dappled light.

He sighs. “They’re gone. For now.”

“Who are they, Professor?”

He doesn’t answer for a long moment, and when he answers, his voice rasps flatly. “Jedi. Or Jedi-killers. Maybe both.”

A stone plummets in Rey’s gut.

The Jedi. Controllers of the Age books.

“What can we do?”

“Hide here until the sun sets. Move out at nightfall.”

The shadows are lengthening; unless Takodana is terribly different from Jakku, it might be another hour, maybe two at most. Not so long — and then they can find their way back to his Age. To safety.

“Rey.”

His gloved fingers close around her wrist, and she realizes that while one of her hands is splayed against the tree, bracing herself, the other is knotted in his cloak.

_ Oh. _

She forces her fingers open, but the Professor still holds her wrist, refusing to let her pull away.

He slips the satchel strap over his shoulder, letting the laden pack settle on the ground before unlooping her empty bag and setting it down, too.

He lays her hand on his chest before releasing her wrist, moving his gloved hand to the far side of the V of roots as he steadies himself. “Wait.”

Then he turns away again, watching the path.

And they do wait — but even as Rey’s heartbeat steadies, she doesn’t hear the men return.

The Professor’s own heart thumps under her palm, making her hand tingle like the crystal viewer.

Later, when she’s alone in her bed, she’ll be wishing she was here, now. With him, damn and blast the bloody danger.

The excuse to be this close to him is worth it.

The shadows slip higher, throwing the forest into a tangle of darkness interrupted by stray beams of golden light — and finally he turns back to her.

He doesn’t say anything, not at first. Simply looks at her, his helmet tilting lower as his gaze runs down the length of her body, half-crumpled beneath his lankier one.

His hand doesn’t move from where it’s planted on the tree root, but the other rises to the line of buttons on the front of the strange dress. His glove squeaks as he cups her breast, running his thumb over the gentle swell and circling her nipple.

“Professor—”

“Quiet.” His fingers tighten, his touch becoming rough, greedy as he manipulates her supple flesh, and his heart pounds harder under her hand.

It’s so  _ wrong _ . This isn’t the time or the place for this kind of thing — but surely he’s aware of that.

Maybe it’s the wrongness of it all that’s making him touch her like this.

She glances down at his trousers, and his long fingers wrap around her wrist, dragging it lower after her gaze.

Rey cries out softly as he presses her hand against the hard line of his cock, guiding her along his shaft in unhurried strokes. He’s like living metal, warm and unyielding, throbbing and hungry.

Hungry for  _ her _ .

“This is what you do to me, Rey,” the masked man before her tells her, clasping her fingers against him even tighter as though to prove his point.

His other hand moves to her thigh, and he pushes the paneled skirt up out of the way, securing it against the bottom line of the bodice so that her leg is bare up to the curve of the garment’s built-in panties.

But instead of finding his way between her legs, his roving hand moves higher, working the buttons of the panel over her tits open until he can flip it down, baring her breasts to the cooling air.

“What if they come back?” Rey whispers.

“Let me worry about that.”

His cock twitches under her hand as she molds her fingers around his shaft, and he hisses with pleasure as she grips him firmly.

Rey’s cunt cramps with need at the sound. To feel all of this inside her … no wonder he’s being so cautious. He feels thick enough, long enough to break her altogether — and her teeth sink into her lower lip, the pain grounding her as she yearns for him.

It  _ is _ a good distraction from her terror. Not that she could ever admit as much aloud.

Professor Ren’s black-gloved fingers pinch her nipples, tugging them as she grinds the heel of her palm along his erection. He kneels over one of her legs, his hand finally slipping lower, skimming down the front of the underbust corset to her knickers.

The snaps securing the fabric over her pussy give way in a series of sharp pops, and she gasps as he dips a finger into her, stroking along the length of her crease. She’s dripping for him — and he holds up his hand, rubbing the wetness between his thumb and forefinger, inspecting it.

“So wet,” he growls quietly. Then his hand is cupping her pussy again, stroking through her folds and circling her slick hole so perfectly that she tilts her hips to meet him. “What a greedy girl…”

Rey flushes with mortification, but he sounds pleased — and she keeps running her hand along him where he’s stiff and trembling, aching for more of him as he releases her wrist to cage his fingers about her throat.

“Open my pants.”

“Yes, Professor,” Rey sighs. Her hands are shaking more with desire than fear now, but it still takes her a few tries until the fabric parts for her.

“Good girl.” He teases her clit with his knuckle. “Now pull out my cock.”

His underclothes stretch as she tugs at them, and then his erection is free, naked in her hands like a silken rock.

She gives him an exploratory stroke, rewarded as he surges in her hands, and he sinks a finger into her, drawing a whimper from her lips as he caresses her soft walls.

His gloved fingers feel even more intrusive than his bare hands, his masked face utterly lost to her as she pumps his length, matching the slow rhythm of his finger inside her. He twists another digit into her, spreading her tender cunt and thrusting into her harder as his thumb grazes her clit.

The cool, berry-scented air flows through her mask as the Professor’s fingers strain inside her, and his hard phallus shivers in her grip. A bead of clear precum beads at the head of his cock, and she smears it over his skin, delighting in the way his fingers skid over him in wet lines.

His hand drifts from her throat to her breasts, fondling her again as his incursions in her pussy grow rougher — and she cradles his cock in both hands, half-lost already as she works him.

It’s so easy to imagine that his fingers are his erection shattering her open, his hard root grinding against her clit with every thrust instead of his thumb.

The silence, the anonymity of his face, his body … it should horrify her, but it only makes her wetter, the ravenous ache in her belly urging her to rock onto him as he pushes deeper into her. His hips sway faintly, too, like he wants to piston through the increasingly slick cage of her fingers.

_ Take me, Professor, take me now, take me please… _

He’s nearly indistinguishable from the lengthening shadows, a dark wraith hunched over her and penetrating her, drawing sloppy sounds from her virgin cunt as he fingers her three knuckles deep.

A strange impulse makes her spare a hand from him long enough to swipe along her own sopping, overfilled pussy — and a rumble of pleasure shakes his body as she finds him again, oiling him with her essence.

“Come for me,” he rasps, a monster in a mask. “Orgasm on my fingers.  _ Now _ .”

She didn’t realize she was so close to the brink, but a few moments’ determined clenching about his thrusting digits is enough to bring her to oblivion, shuddering and spasming as he strokes her through the rapture.

She’d give anything to feel him sheathe himself in her body where she’s tender and yielding — but his free hand abandons her tits to close around her fingers again, crushing them against his cock, guiding her faster. Harder.

“Please, Professor,” she begs, but it’s too late.

He jerks his hips backward, tilting down — and warmth pours through her fingers to spatter on her naked thighs as he cums.

Rey stares down at her defiled legs, awash with horror, triumph, and giddy delight as birdsong echoes through the trees. 

Her own efflux is clear, if sticky; this is creamy, trickling along her skin in rivulets and dripping to the ground between the gnarled roots. She trails a finger through one of the fatter droplets, savoring the sensation of the strange new substance.

“You’ve never seen cum before, have you?”

Even through the voice-changer he sounds wondering, amused, and she shakes her head.

His gloved forefinger joins hers, swirling through the puddles on her leg. 

Then, before she can react, he brings his hand back to her ecstasy-swollen cunt, grunting quietly as he shoves his fingers inside her again.

She clamps her lips together, muffling the cry before it tears out of her throat — and he chuckles, tracing his fingertips along her inner walls, drawing circles inside her.

“This is where my cum belongs.”

Rey moans softly in relief as he withdraws from her, but he only scoops up another fat bead of cum from her thigh, daubing it on the stiff peaks of her nipples.

“I’ll come here, too. Probably sooner. But  _ inside _ you, Rey…”

She pants as his hand drifts lower again, swiping up more thick fingerfuls of his cum and thrusting them into her pussy, shoving deep.

“…this is where my cum really belongs.”

With one final press of her clit, the Professor pulls back — and this time she knows he’s done, because he tucks his softening cock back into his pants, refastening them without another word.

Rey fumbles with her own clothes as he stands. Twilight’s fallen over the forest valley; miraculously, she manages to get the garment closed again in the dim light, resnapping the crotch even as their mingled slickness seeps out to dampen the fabric.

By the time she’s ready, the Professor is fully composed again, still anonymous under his helmet and cloak. Only his scent gives him away, the only thing that’s familiar to her in this whole world.

That, and the fear that still clings to her, looming at the edges of her mind.

“Let’s go,” he says, his voice unreadable through his mask’s distortion — and Rey trudges after him, pussy drenched and head brimming with more questions than answers as they move out along the darkling trail.

**Author's Note:**

> Like 2020 I'm a trash fire, please feed me comments 🔥🔥🔥


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